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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 

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UNITE!) STATES OF AMERICA. 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET 



AN INDIAN DRAMA 



/ 

ALFRED ANTOINE FURMAN 



New York 

STETTINER, LAMBERT & CO. 

22-26 Reade Street 

1894 



A 



"x. 






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Copyright 1894 

BY 

ALFRED ANTOINE FURMAN 

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED 



TO 

UNITED STATES SENATOR 

WATSON C. SQUIRE of Washington, 

IN TOKEN OF 

THE MANY ACTS OF KINDNESS I HAVE RECEIVED FROM HIS HANDS, 

THIS VOLUME 

IS RESPECTFULLY INSCRIBED. 



THE VOICELESS RACE. 



The sun drops through that ancient roof of green 
Thatching your home not made by human hand, 
But nevermore on silent lake or land 
Shall what he viewed by him again be seen. 

From the dark soil ye sprang and in that soil 
Have faded now, and no memorial left 
Save ruin, and a stern delight that kept 
Her throne in visioned minds when time a spoil 

Had made of all things else. So let it be. 

Say, Gheezis breath was weary, and no more 
Blew summer in the branches of your tree. 

Best is it that the wind from orien t shore 

Should blast you, friendless hands tear down your 

name, 
And file a lien on your house of fame. 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 



PERSONvS REPRESENTED. 

PoMETACOM, called Philip, Chief of the Wampanoags. 

Annawan, Wampanoag. 

Tatoson, " 

tuspaquin, *' 

Alderman, Pocasset. 

Agamaug, " 

ToTATOMET, Secoiiet. 

Samponcut, " 

Anumpash, " 

Canonchet, Narraganset. 

QUINNAPIN, " 

POMHAM, "■ 

Uncas, Mohegan. 
Oneko, " 
MoNOKO, Nipmuck. 
Metacomet, Son of Philip. 
JosiAH WiNSLOw, Governor of Plymouth. 
Benjamin Church, Commander of the Puritan Forces. 
Captain Thomas Lothrop. 
Captain Samuel Mosely. 
Captain Roger Golding. 
Wenonah, Sqtiaw-Sachem of the Seconets. 
Wootonekanuske, Wife to Philip. 
Wanda, Wife to Samponcut. 

Indian Braves of the Allied Tribes, Squaws, Soldiers, 
Citizens. 

Scene : Dispersedly in Massachusetts and Rhode 

Island. 

Time : 1675-1676. 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 



ACT I. 

SCENE I. PoKANOKET. A spring at the foot of a 
cliff ; above, under the trees, the lodges of the 
Wampanoags. 

Enter Alderman, who bends to drink at the rock, Aga- 
MAUG and Tatoson. 

Agamaug. Wah ! 
My brother's heart is sad. 

Tatoson. Can streams escaped from winter's hand 
Mirror a sky of calm ? These ears have drunk 
A grievous tale. 

Agamaug. Let the Wampanoag 
Speak : open are the ears of Agamaug. 

Tatoson. Listen ! In a deep glen where still 
at noon 
Twilight binds up the face of day, I met 
A runner who from Apaum lodges came. 
Where, when his heart had withered and turned 

black, 
Dwelt Sassamon. 

Alderman. Have I not heard 
The worms feed on him now ? 



lO PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

Tatoson. Pocasset, his arms are long- ; 

And after liim they drag into the earth 
Three of our braves. 

Aga^naug. I am to learn. 

A Iderman. Brother, 

The whites, because he trod their moral ways. 
Harbored his cause: and who shall hold their hand ? 

Tatoson. Are the Pokanokets 

Dogs to bear this ? Can we say to the squaw 
Wampapaquin, the Apaums have his scalp, 
And in the pale-face field his nation fears 
To reap revenge ? 

Agamaug. Unhappily ye nursed 

Hatred to Sassamon. 

Tatoson. 'Sh ! A renegade, 

The worship of his fathers' Manitou 
Was not good in his eyes ; but he would rub 
His superstition's itch by bowing down 
Before a thorn-crowned man, and in a book 
Read how he died for him. Nathless, he coined 
Falsehoods, and passed them in the white men's 

ears : 
Our braves threw over him the net of death, 
That snared them too. 

Alderman, Fancies thy Sachem that their act 
Of friendship tastes ? 

Tatoson. Pometacom 

Travelled in month of leaves where the sun sleeps: 
To hasten his return our fleetest brave 
Unwinds his breath. Brothers, our young men live 
In hovel of disgrace, if they shall lay 
No axe at foot of this death-tree : in vain 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. II 

This Storm plant bears the blood of some slain chief 
To paint our cheeks for war. 

[Breaks off a blood-root poppy^ and zvith its crim- 
son juice smears his face and brcast.\ 

Hist ! here is the Chief 
Coming- with Annawan. Borrow with me, 
While they confer, the shelter of a tree. 

[Exeunt. 

Enter Philip and Annawan. 

Philip. Annawan, 

I do not think a sweeter spring than this 
Leaps to the sun; it travels through the earth 
From house of purity, and brings us health. — 
I would pass by a twenty rills though thirst 
Shrivel my tongue, to quaff of thee. 

[Takes a horn cup from his belt, fills it and 
drinks.^ 

Annawan. By Wabun ! 

Philip. [Passes rapidly to Annawan and whis- 
pers :\ I heard a twig 
Snapped; there are moccasins: see what it is ! 

A nnawan. [Examines the foot-prints. ] 
Wampanoag ! May never pale-face come 
Nearer than now ! 

Philip. Ha! do they feel 

The scalps burn on their heads ? 

Annawan. Nushkah ! our eyes have been 
behind a cloud. 
Sachem, their new-fledged purpose must not fly. 
While we have breathing, into action's sky. 

Philip. Kah ! A serpent by the fang 

They take in me. How did they die ? 



12 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

Annawan. As they had lived, 

Strangers to fear. 

Philip. I mean, by fire or steel: I know they went 
Equipped with honor. 

Annazvan. Sachem, with me : 

Hard by the palisades of Plymouth town 
Looms up a gallows gaunt ; and on its arms, 
Rocked by the winds, bewept by pitying clouds, 
The forms of Panoso and Mattashun 
Swing to and fro ; and flocks of sordid fowl 
Fatten them at the crystal windows where 
Looked out on this fierce world those candid souls. 
A nobler end welcomed Wampapaquin : 
For standing with his eyes unbound, his brow 
Bared to the golden sun, erect, unmoved, 
The message came written in leaden hail 
Which sank him down drenched in more honest 

blood — 
Nushkah ! — than musters in their arrogant veins 
Since time began. 

Philip. Their spirits pardon me ! 

Look down, ye braves, and register my vow. 
In rank ye were the least among my tribe; 
But here on ancient site of this your race 
I swear your end deeply shall be avenged. 
Wake, dogs of war ! and with your ulcered tongues 

\ Lick up the drops that so untimely flowed, 

Till your swart veins shall swell to mountain size 

And burst in pitiless havoc on the land. 

With solemn hand married to your redress, 

I now unbelt my hatred of the whites ; 

And bid it roam sleepless the bounds of earth 

In quest of blood to sate its appetite. 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. I3 

Annawaii. Pometacom, 

Justice shall come again on this wild scene, 
And hallow thee. 

Philip. Ay, Chief, if I should tell 

What we have borne, meekly and humbly borne, 
The tedious story must bankrupt the day. 
And even be a debtor to the night. 

Annazvan. Oh Sachem ! shall words, and words 
alone, 
Build up this flame ? 

Philip. No, Annawan, 

The fuel of our wrongs shall feed the blaze 
Till its red jaws devour their settlements. 
Assemble here the warriors when the moon 
Hangs on the western wall her silver bow. 
Send wind-fleet messengers to Canonchet, 
Bidding him to our war-dance lead his braves ; 
To the wile-loving Uncas and his chiefs 
Whose fame on brow of deeds unspeakable 
Redly is written ; to the Pocasset Squaw ; 
To her who sways the ocean Seconets ; 
And all the tribes that moist with tears of rage 
The scant meat eaten by grace of English hands : 
White wampum to them send, of our resolve 
A pledge, framed in fair words. Do not delay. 

Annawan. This points to my desire. 

I go, Pometacom. \Exit, 

Philip. I lean on thee ! — 

The arrow from the bow is sped. Hence, peace ! 
And crouch in slavish breasts : thou didst infect 
Our valor's health with indolence and fear. 
And played the pander to our virgin pride. 
Come, painted war ! and sack the house of life, 



14 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

Hanging thy features with its ruby wealth, 
Till they shall seem so noble in our eyes 
That every forest child shall worship thee. 

[Exit. 

SCENE II, — SoGKONATE. A lodge on the seashore, 
with the Seconet village in the distance, amid tufts 
of coarse grass and clumps of dwarf pines. 

AiiVUVA?>Yi, painting his face in the ocean mirror; Tota- 
TOMET, in war dress and armed, pacing the sands. 

Totatomet. I loved her, Anumpash : 

Not twenty whites with all their cloud of heart. 
Dilated in the pure serene of love. 
Could reach to mine. Our thoughts, our lives 

were twinned, 
As buds to spring, as shadows to the night, 
We sought all strange and solitary haunts — 
The uncompanionable rock, the sea 
In whose white mane I joyed to wind my hand. 
And whirl away. For her I grappled death 
What time a venomed brute crouched in the grass, 
His fearful rattles shaking, lanced her side : 
I sucked the wound, and of the poison drank 
Deep draughts, to pension her with life. For her, 
To signalize my prowess in her eyes, 
I took the black bear in mine arms and fed 
My hungry knife with his bold blood . And she 
Would watch my coming with expectant eyes ; 
And a warm glance rewarded all my toils. 
Now all is changed ! And why .? Am 1 not held 
The foremost warrior of the Seconets, 
So far before in every woodland art 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET, I5 

The foot of competition limps behind ? 
What maiden of the village would not bless 
The happy hour that led her to my lodge ? 
That hell-sent pale-face hath bewitched the Squaw 
With praises of her liquid eye, her hair 
Falling adown her neck like midnight's wing : 
His adder tongue hath charmed her silly wit, 
And hissed away the favor she was wont 
To rapture me. I hate him : he must die. 

Anumpash. Ay, let him die. 

Totatomet. Hark, Anumpash ! 

The stalk of peace is rotten and decayed ; 
And weeds of strife grow in our quiet fields. 
I offer her to bitter thoughts, and seek 
War as a bride. The brave Wampanoags 
Will hold a war-dance at Pokanoket, 
And paint them for the fray, what time the moon 
Her silver bow hangs on the western wall. 
Haste we to gird our fortunes in their cause: 
Some chance will point the way to my revenge. 

AmunpasJi. I am with thee. 

Enter Samponcut, zvitJi nets on his shoulder. 

Samponcut. Peace be with thee, Totatomet. 

Totatomet, We parted but this hour, and I am 
friend 
Only to strife. 

Samponcut. What ! hath an indigestion base 
Usurped thy wonted humor's seat, and turned 
The fur of thy serenity ? In truth, 
He is my mortal foe, and could I take 
The varlet at advantage, I would trip 
His heavy heels and pummel so his ribs, 



l6 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

He would shake off the arm of my acquaintance, 

And never look me in the face again. 

Whip him with a spare meal, the Meda says ; 

But I and fasting can no more agree 

Than oil and water. 

Totatomet. Ah ! Samponcut, 

The time hath indigestion, and it groans 
To bear upon its back these slothful days. 
Mix me in thine alembic what will cure 
The jaundiced state, and I will fee thy skill 
With boundless wealth of praise. 

Samponcut, Oh, brave, what pay to hedge 

Me from the winter winds ! Yet for I love 
Thy youth, I counsel thee. Thy mind is ill, 
And host to vain desires. Content will splint 
Thy broken hopes, heir thee to happiness. 
Content hath a free hand : he scatters joys 
On every step of this our mortal way. 
Like the dull snail, he carries on his back 
All that he owns ; his patrimony is 
The fair landscape ; the ray of a June sun 
His wampum all. 

Totatomet. I understand 
Nothing of this. Come, Anumpash ! 

Samponcut. Hold, 

Totatomet ! Wenonah hath forbid 
Thy going hence. Afrenzied is thy mind 
By fasting in the war-devoted grove ; 
Thou hast dressed up in battle garb ; thy cheeks. 
Thy massive breast with all the symbols dread 
Painted, and shaven thy head till the scalp-lock 
But now remains wherein the foe may twine 
His dripping hand. To slaughter are thy thoughts 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. I7 

Neighbors, on trails of war will set thy feet. 
No more to bask thee in the vivid sun 
And nod the hours away ; no more to sit 
Within thy wigwam's shade, and gloating pick 
A partridge breast. In river of this past 
Wade, and the voice of loss shall bid thee stay. 

Totatomet. I weep for thee, my mother Sogko^ 
nate ! 
The rule deputed to a squaw whose cheek 
Moulteth its ruby plume at voice of war : 
Whose power is built on packs of foolish ones 
Fettered to grossness. The six Pokanokets 
Who came with offers from Pometacom 
To seal a firm alliance of our tribes, 
By pale-face wheedling and intrigue dismissed 
With marks of outrage and contempt ; this hand 
Disdained ; and in the chalice of my life 
A brood of vipers dropped ! Oh ! that I had 
The thunder's mouth to rattle in their ears 
My loathing tongue ! 

Samponciit. Ho! ho! Totatomet, 

Cannot our peaceful life roof in and close 
Those towering thoughts which wander to the 

stars ! 
Thy totem bar this summer storm of Squaw 
Wenonah thy best self curdle and cream: 
Thy genuine merit will her coquetry 
Outface, to thy devotion bow her choice. 
But calm thy sea of passion ere it roll 
Upon thy beach of fortune ; and beget 
Pappooses none so choleric and rash. 

Totatomet. Old man, I have no time, no wish, 

To list these homilies. Within this bag 



l8 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

I have put up some acorns and parched maize; 
And kindred spirits by the willows wait 
Our coming, to join the heroes of the age. 
Sunk in the ooze of sloth, crawl, Samponcut, 
With belly groaning 'neath its load of food 
Unto thine end: the feast of battle mine. 

Samponcut. But pray thee wait a moment while 
mine eyes 
Feed on thy martial brow. In youth I heard 
The dark tale of a warrior who like thee 
Glory incensed; and if my strangered tongue 
Trip not in memory's path, of him they said : 
Lo! in his eye how stern command doth ride ; 
How swells his heart with passion's angry tide ; 
And in his legs there chafes a bridled steed 
Shall chase the whites with more than mortal 
speed. 

Totatomet. No lazy tide 

Flows in thy throat ! But moccasin of thine, 
Catcher of eels, will never brush aside 
The forest leaves, with braves on the war-path. 
I pardon thee for that thy soul is mean. 
And no time hath the face of battle seen. 
Thy blood is stagnant, and it cannot feel 
The perfect joy of war ; what time we steal 
With tomahawk uplifted on the foe, 
Sprinkling the glad earth with his abject brain ; 
To dance with rapturous whoopings in the glow 
Of burning houses; and to count our gain 
Of guns and scalps and maidens pale with woe : 
Then with wild pride fade in the woods again. 

Samponcut. No ; I am fat and cannot run like 
thou. 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 19 

Long hath our tribe hung round the neck of peace; 
And I am only valiant 'gainst the waves 
Whose pale green shoulders nestle in the arms 
Of these white sands. Rein in thy surly pride ; 
And down life's stream with me serenely glide. 
Totatomet. When the bee drinks no more at 
honey-wells. \^Exit. 

Anumpash. And the dew falls at noon. S^Exit. 
Samponcut, I breathe again ! 

A captive in the Mohawk towns he drank 
Their spirit fierce. Dropped in these tranquil 

days, 
He's like a goby jerked on the wan shore 
With a bone hook. So shake my nerves again, 
Brain fever puts me in a bed of leaves. 
By Peboan ! I doubt me if our shaved 
Warriors glean profit in this field of war; 
For fortune wears the pale-face in her heart, 
And like a lover smiles on all his plans. 
To let us sit beneath the tree of peace 
Was wisdom in Wenonah, though her course 
The white chief steered, who put to headlong rout 
The gallants of our tribe, and stormed the fort 
Of her affections. A moment of thy time. 
Oh Manitou ! thy servant pilfers now, 
Beseeching thee to hold the Seconet 
Nation pure of Wampanoags. I craved 
Hard knocks on the head never, no, not I : 
Though it is blamable— have the winds ears ?— 
Sweet braves, to say it in these iron times, 
I own I love my life, and still prefer 
To wade at ebb tide for a nest of clams 
Than to adorn my lodge with long-haired scalps. 



20 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

But now the golden scout of day is camped 

Proudly upon the blue hills of the sky: 

'Tis time that Wanda had prepared my meal — 

Corn- cake, mussels, fat pemmican and teal. 

Cherish thy stomach, braves, and all is well : 

By that neglect our star of empire fell. \^Exit. 



SCENE III.— PoKANOKET. The centre of the Wampa- 
noag village, a wide grassy space surrounded by 
the bark lodges of the tribe. On one side a huge 
fire of pine knots ; on the other, a young oak strip- 
ped of its branches and planted in the earth as a 
war-pole. In a semicircle are seated, silent and 
grave, the leading chiefs, Philip, Canonchet, 
Uncas, Tuspaquin, Annawan, Pomham, while 
grouped by rock and tree the Sagamores and braves, 
Alderman, Agamaug, Oneko, Quinnapin, Monoko, 
Tatoson, and others, Wampanoags, Narragansets, 
Pocassets, Nipmucks. Time : night, the new 
moon low in the western sky. 

Quinnapin. The trail of the Mohegans is long. 

Oneko. They see more glory on the brow of peace. 

Alderman. Say rather that the fiery blasts of war 
Shrivel their leaves of courage up. 

Quinnapin. A pattern here ! Wenonah's braves 
Skulk in their lodges. 

Monoko. Yet would they scorn to prowl 

In lodges of their friends. 

Quinnapin. Ha ! 

Oneko. And is it true 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 21 

Ye bartered all ? Not even a poor ditch 
To fight them in ! 

Quinnapin. An thou wilt fight, 

The rabbit wears a valiant heart and cries 
^ Esa ' to the she-bear. 

Oneko. Nay, drinker of fire ! 

In fields of war my victories are won, 
Not reaped in arms of squaws. 

Qidyinapin. Oh Unktahee ! 

No scalp thy belt dangles but it was gleaned 
In head of some decrepit wretch who blessed 
The Master of Life thou kindly didst snuff out 
The candle of his woes, Yerks forth thy hand 
Some wintry hairs, straightway thy fawning 

tongue 
Whispers, Lo ! here a brave. Woman ! 

Ojieko. Thy soul, if thou hast one, 

Howlings inherit ! If my lodge were bare 
As thine of noble trophies, I would beg 
The first pappoose make in my lily heart 
Bed for his knife of lath. Dog ! 

Tatoson. Sheath your disputes ! To-morrow 
you shall drink 
Your fill of blood. 

Quinnapin. Go to ! Next he eats salt 

Like any white. 

Enter ToTATOMET and Seconet braves. 

Tatoson. The paint of the Seconets ! 

Totatomet. You called for fighting men, 

And we are here. 

Warriors, Ugh ! ugh ! ugh ! 



22 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

Philip. [Arises and advances to the zvar-post.'] 
My worthy Seconets ! 
You rock my hopes in cradle of success. — 
Mohegan, thou art welcome : on thy head 
The years sit lightly ; thy great voice of fame 
Our every wigwam hears. — Canonchet, here 
Be free ! The heritage of a proud name 
Never did fall in purer hands ; subdued 
Our honors stand before the face of thine. — 
Brothers, you tread on your own soil. 

Canonchet. Our hearts are glad, Pometacom. 

Uncas. Sachem, mine eyes are bleared ; they 
cannot see 
The calumet of peace. 

Philip. No sacred smoke, 

Uncas, will curl thee from that bowl to-day. — 
Brothers, your ears have heard 
The cry that rises from Pokanoket ; 
You were not sleeping when our arrows came 
Covered with blood. What then ? A fifty years 
Have fallen from the wrinkled hand of time 
Since first the pale-face seized these virgin shores, 
And sowed such changes in our field of fate. 
They were but few ; and on Patuxet rock 
Huddled, their hosts were gloomy rain and cold 
That chain the spirited blood in cells of death ; 
And hunger, shearing off life's golden fleece. 
My father, Massasoit, hand in hand 
Travelled with gentleness ; and to his breast. 
In luckless day, he took the frozen viper 
And warmed it into life. He gave them corn ; 
And counsel from his hospitable mind ; 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 23 

And built them lodges in the red man's land. 
His kindness was the author of our fall : 
Quenched at its birth this fatal brand of strife 
Had sputtered out in ashes of his power, 
And we had held our fathers' heritage. 
They waxed in greatness like the moon : at first 
A silver thread lacing the waist of heaven, 
It grows a ball of brightness till its orb 
In beauty lights the ebon cheek of night. 
Over the barren seas their sail-winged barks 
Hundreds of white men bore. Their towns arose 
Like spirits of the dark, with motion fringed 
The curving bays, the rapid rivers' banks. 
Whose solitude had echoed but the cries 
Of red men since the earth was young. Like mist 
We melted in the rays of this new sun. 
Our lands are coaxed to flow, despite our will. 
Into their hands ; our hunting grounds, dark, pure, 
Betrayed to light ; our warriors from their faith. 
None nobler now, seduced, and taught to pray 
To unknown gods, the Spirit who rides in storms. 
Who loved our fathers and our fathers loved. 
Torn from the sky ! We quaffed the crystal spring. 
And reason kept him on his noble throne : 
Now in the burning waves of their new drink 
Founders the vessel of our native pride. 
Their laws invade our immemorial rights 
Bequeathed from sire to son, and snare our feet 
Walking in the old ways ; and lo ! our braves 
Death-doomed without a trial by their peers, 
The gallows arbitrating ! Ye forest sons ! 
Lords of yourselves and born to liberty. 
Whose merits should stand free and unabashed 



24 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

Before the eye of fortune, will ye lick, 
Fallen so low, the hand of this harsh change, 
And perish in the furious tide of wrong ? 
Or shaking off your dream of apathy, 
Free our beloved Kinshon from the yoke ? 
Brothers, decide ! Pometacom hath spoke. 

[A long silence, 

Uncas. [Arises in his place and bends slightly 
forward with raised-up hand.^ 

I seem to hear the voice of other days 
Buried in silence ; music that will charm 
Trees and dull rocks out of their patient forms 
To follow thee admiring. But are thy braves 
Rebels to life, that they will take up arms 
Against the hand of fate ? Is the Great Spirit 
Recruiting his bright legions in the sky. 
And drafts Wampanoags ? Pometacom, 
What gifts hast thou from nature : use them well ! 
* Let not ambition leap upon thy will, 
To drive thee in the bitter gulf of war 
Scattered with bleaching hopes. Sit in thy lodge, 
And let thy lusty braves the unfooted wilds 
Wander by side of peace. 

Pomham. Sachem, who can divorce 

The red man from his bride of war ? Her form 
Beckoned his eye in lone antiquity. 
And taught his arm the practice of revenge. 
In paths of lowness let Mohegans tread : 
The Narraganset bosom cannot nurse 
Children of fear. The finger of the whites 
Hath smeared a dark spot on the red man's lodge, 
And only blood can wash it out. 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 25 

Uncus, I deem in house of age 

Prudence should dwell. Alas ! my words are cold. 
The sceptre of the Sachem's eloquence 
Waving your fervid souls to battle's edge, 
I do not sway : the plummet of my thoughts 
I can but drop in wisdom's pure, cold well. 
The lurid face of war with serpents twined, 
I worshipped : ere your hands could stretch the 

bow, 
Down from his gloomy brow had I plucked fame, 
And gorged the ashen fruits of victory 
Purchased by streams of blood. But is it good 
To press our lips unto a burning stream ? 
To so dire wharf mooring our nation's bark ? 
Where is the Pequod race whose genius supped 
From the red hand of war ? In the great Eye 
That overlooks the world and reads our lives. 
Ye are rebuked if their so fiery fate 
Scorch not the lustre of your new design. 
From them I draw my blood ; and when they stood, 
The forest lords, mantled in bright reAown, 
Around the war-post could a thousand braves 
Rally, the song obsequious to death 
In frenzy chanting, frenzy and despair. 
In evil hour they stirred the English power 
Sleeping till then ; and like a drought-lit fire 
With crimson feet raging in autumn woods, 
It fell on them consuming. Where are they now ? 
The earth can tell : like seared and yellow leaves 
Chased by the wind and crammed in winter's maw, 
Their blighted honors strew the ground of time. 
Softly doth age m)' knot of life untie ; 
Soon must I step down in the mortal stream, 
2 



26 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

And taste the inevitable wave of death : 
Yet not so dim mine eyes but they can see 
Yawning a grave for them who string their hopes 
On pale-face conquest. Ye stumblers, I have said. 

Monoko. I rub the cheek of Uncas, and I see 
A pale-face skin : the whites have given him 
A petticoat, and in his lodge with squaws 
Have bid him stay. Soonever he hears move 
His masters' lips, come, he comes ; go, he goes ; 
And eats the crumbs that from their tables fall. 
But in the foretime when the noble sun 
Climbed out the crimson windows of the east, 
Until he laved his brow in western waves, 
He saw no slave. Sachems, I am too old 
To learn the lessons of obedience ; 
And I had rather go into the earth 
While freedom lives, than bear her to the tomb. 

Alderman. Ay, Monoko, it flies on wing of truth : 
If Pequods tread no more the provident earth 
Uncas can tell : were not his arrows aimed 
At Pequod hearts ? A red man's memory 
Is longer than the justice of the whites. 

Annawan. Braves, your proud words 

Roll up the shadows from my memory's sky. 
Methinks I see that oak so serious clad 
In rustling robe of green, and lifting high 
A storm-swept head above its forest kin. 
Felled in the morning of renown. But yet 
From out its prostrate fertile trunk shall spring 
A well-starred tribe whose roots shall pierce the 

earth 
Still deeper, and whose brow shall kiss the skies. 
Why should our courage faint beneath the breath 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 



27 



Of Yengeese fortune ? Every thought of peace 
Disown while breathe our air and tread our soil 
They who should dwell in flaming heart of hell. 

Totatomet. Wampanoag, 

No Seconet but thou hast fathered me. 
My thought is naked as the common air, 
And leaps to press the lips of thine intent, 
In its own strength reposing, and your right: 
For me one hour of sloth-reproving strife 
Outweighs a century of sluggish life. 

Tiispaquin. I learn the way ! 

Give all the braves to know that purer blood 
Than mountain dew, on which thy heart hath fed ! 
The springs may dry, if yet to slake our thirst 
Veins of the pale-face flow. 

Quinnapin. Brothers, is Apaum fortune built so 
strong, 
The Narraganset arm may not reach up 
And tear it down ? Lead on, Pometacom, 
And death shall own allegiance to this arm. 

Warriors. Ugh ! ugh ! ugh ! 

Canonchet. Pometacom, 

I pledge mine arms and Narraganset bands 
To clothe in acts thy purpose and commands. 

Uncas. Great Narraganset, kindle not a fire 
In whose red arms thy nation will expire. 

Pomkain. He counsels thee whose father he 
betrayed. 

Canonchet. Not that way, Shawomet! The hand 
of time 
Hath healed that wound: the dead are happier far 
Than base ones breathing. — But ye, alone as now, 
Can ye find honor in your enslaved lodge 



28 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

Paled round with curses deep ; and be content 
To barter skins for scarlet coats and guns ; 
To search the wrinkled shore for purple shells, 
And drill you strings of wampum — trade of 

squaws ? 
Can ye with clean hands to the Great Spirit's 

lodge 
Carry your lives ? Fawn on the pale-face hand, 
Hearts treason-bit, and fix your perilled eye 
On Plymouth lips so dear. My soul is free : 
The air of peace blows like a furnace blast. 
And stifles it. — 

Dig up the hatchet buried now too long, 
And glad me with your ancient battle song. 
Lo ! here I strike. 

[Advances to the war-post and buries his hatchet in it. 
Rude drums. The Wampanoags advance and chant 
their war-cry^ 

THE WAR-SONG. 



The chain of peace is snapped in twain, 
Our sturdiest braves in ambush slain; 

But squaws alone will weep: 
Be ours to grasp the tomahawk, 
And through the files of battle stalk 

To bathe in vengeance deep. 

Ye forest sons ! arise ! arise ! 
And ring your war-whoops to the skies; 
And where a foe shall rear his head 
Bequeath him to the silent dead. 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 29 



Your fathers' wrongs call from the earth; 
Your own chase from your breast its mirth, 

For vengeance crying loud: 
No longer creep from birth to death; 
But rise and fling away your breath 

In voice of triumph proud. 



See from its grave the hatchet leap, 
In blood the face of foes to steep, 

While round the warriors smile: 
He who shall die in cause like this, 
Shall wash his soul in tides of bliss 

On Manitou's blue isle. 

Agatnang. Would this were heart of all our 
enemies ! \Strikes. 

Tatoson, No way but this : 

A warrior's life is bliss. [^Strikes. 

Uiicas. Their minds turn out of doors the one 
wise voice. 
Master of Life ! if still with favor on thy red 
Children thou lookest, hang not on their hopes 
This insane veil that blinds and muffles up 
The face of reason. Come ! We may not stay : 
Their feet are wending on a tragic way. — 
We go, Pometacom ; but come what may. 
My wonder holds thee more than common clay. 
Oneko. [To Quinnapin.] I see a halter dangling 
in the air. 
To clasp, thy gullet in its fingers bare. 



30 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

Qiiinnapin. I see a whip suspended in the air, 
Which I would clutch to welt thy shoulders bare ; 
But I disdain to soil me with such fry, 
When noble souls await my hand to die. 

Oncko. Perchance the future may reserve for me, 
That I may lay it, Quinnapin, on thee. 

\Exeunt Uncas <^?/<^Oneko. 
Philip. Thy years be honored ! — 

And yet we should have known a generous thought 
Poured never from his lips. But it is well. 
My braves are numerous as the sparkling sands 
On which the ocean clasps his emerald hands ; 
Their hearts are panting for the battle fray : 
I could not if I wished it say them nay. \Strikes. 
\All tJie chief s and warriors in succession advance to the 
war-pole and hack it with their hatchets ; then they 
pass around it in a circle and chant the burden of a 
battle song : 

We will tread on the heads of the foe. 
In the arms of the dust lay them low. 
At the conclusion they turn to Philip and salute him 
with tumultuous and Joy ficl cries.} 

Philip. Sachems, warriors, Narragansets, tribes- 
men. 
And all bound with me in this belt of war. 
Falters my tongue on mountain of your worth 
Too high for my weak praise to overclimb. 
A presage this of triumph and renown, 
If constancy shall even-footed run 
With valor's steps, and each on honor wait. 
Let no division in your counsels steal. 
The rock on which the Pequod cause was wrecked, 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 3I 

And I from victory to victory 
A path will blaze ; jewel your hands with spoil 
That shall outmint the coinage of your dreams ; 
And weigh your belts with scalps down to the 

ground ; 
And choke your wigwams' mouth with captive foes; 
And build your memory a house of fame 
To dwell forever in. 

Warriors. Ug"h ! ugh ! ugh ! 

Canonchet. Pometacom, 

We walk the clouds with thee. 

Philip. The rich reality shall beggar it. 

Now to your lodges till to-morrow's sun 
Over Pocasset peering see our work begun. 

{^Exeunt. 

SCENE IV. SoGKONATE. The Seconet village. Be- 
fore the lodge of Wenonah on the seashore. 
Moonlight. 

Enter Wenonah and Church. 

Wenonah, Besides, white chief, 

A bitter discontent strides through the tribe, 
Chiding my action with a saucy tongue : 
The head of the revolt, Totatomet, 
Whose gloomy spirit nursed in battle's arms. 
Demanded that the wind of Sogkonate, 
Freighted with war, should blow in Philip's sails. 

Church. Wenonah, in this cause thou hast invited 
Reproach, danger perhaps : thy deed outruns 
My swiftest tongue of praise. 

Wenonah. It is not that, pale-face ; 

For thee I would do that would swallow up 



$2 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

All other doing ; but I am but weak. 

In voice of eloquence and fame of deeds 

That pour a glory on the raging blood, 

Resides a chieftain's power : commands are smoke 

Which, saddled on the air, flees into space, 

When linked to no deserving. 

Church. My people's debt, 

And thine own worth, the best blood of my heart 
Forever seals to thee. 

Wenonah. Pale-face, believe 

'Twas a slight token of my authentic heart, 
Liegeless till now, to throw my feeble will 
Across the track of their desires. When time 
Shall lead a new occasion to my door. 
With truer welcome will I take its hand. 

Church. Thou art made up, compact and firm, 
Of all true qualities. 

Wenonah. If thou say so. 

And censures all the world, I walk in joy. 

Chitrch. Wenonah, doubt me not. 

Wenonah. It seems a dream 

Whose veil the morning's hand will tear away, 
And with the morning flee. 

Church. On such a night 

Never let day-star rise ! 

Wenonah. Oh pale-face, standing here in solemn 
rays 
Of night's great lamp, with spirits of my dead 
Hovering around to witness thy fond words, 
Tell me, can love's weak hand clasp on thy life 
But so the fetters of a red dominion ? 
Haply it is some fancy that will die 
When the pinched snows of absence fall on it ; 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 33 

Some passion, surfeited by futile charms, 
Drowsy shall grow in afternoon of joy ; 
And I would find naught in the weary world 
To succor me despairing. 

Church. Wenonah, wean 

That offspring of thine obdurate doubts : if I 
Unworthy prove, thrust in thy young men's hands 
The ruthless steel to loot and ransack all 
My treasury of life ; let young love be 
By such relapsing slain, and the old hate 
Beleaguer man's false heart. 

Wenonah. Forgive me, Church ; 

'Twas only love that counselled me to doubt. 
In marriage many chiefs have sought my hand : 
Gifts to my lodge their braves have brought to buy 
Consent to their proposals : they have come 
Themselves in feathered dress that domineers 
The eye, to seat them silent by my side, 
Pleading with looks and sighs their amorous cause. 
In all of them the tongue of some defect 
Wrangled with their proud state, and silenced it 
In my imagination. When my eye 
Wandered to thee, its high unlorded glance 
Was taken prisoner by thy noble mien ; 
While reason 'sat subdued by the great fame 
Of strength and skill thou bear est in the world. 
I would wed such a man ; or I would live 
Queen of myself, reigning in solitude. 

Church. I wear no more, 

Wenonah, on my life the bloom of youth ; 
And till this time I was content to be 
A dallier with love ; to tread the earth 



34 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

Alone, leading my passions to the tomb ; 
■ But now my ways are consecrate to thine. 

WenonalL. Alas ! the time poisons my brood of 
hope. 
Thy people call thine arm to their defence, 
And duty's stern hand girds thee for the strife. 
Thy sword will smear its silver lips with blood 
Housed in my nation's veins, and hatred deep 
Will fix a gulf between thy race and mine : 
For every fear my mind a refuge is ! 

Church. Wenonah dear, let not those cares 
Creep on thy cheek, nor livid thoughts of war 
Usurp the peaceful musings of thy life : 
Thy nation will not sail its crimson waves. 
But lie in port of peace. When it is past. 
My fortune in this island will I cast ; 
Building a wigwam in the wilderness 
Where love and thou the solitude shall bless, 

Wenonah. This is the trance. 

The vision of my life ! That I could clip 
The pinions of old Time, so he should sit 
All-patient at our feet, this quietude 
Stretching to crack of doom ! Why wilt thou go ? 

Church. Wild-flower, gathered in desert of my 
life ! 
I will return on wings of swift desire. 
To bathe my longing looks in thy deep eyes. 
What time my duty I discharge to make 
Report at Plymouth town : anxious they wait 
Tidings how this disease infects the land ; 
And if the Seconets, in peace delighting, 
With friendship's hooks are grappled to them still. 
While other tribes flow in the sea of war. 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 35 

But where I go, whatever fate I see, 
In my fond heart thou liv'st eternally. 

VVenonah. Ah me ! too early found, or found too 
late! 
Would we were anchored in the days of peace ! 
This love fixes a stigma on my creed 
Which should, I know, by every forest rule 
Counsel to fortitude. The haggard wilds 
Peopled with grim Pokanokets will rise 
Ever before me, and their shadows stern 
Invade on foot of dream the realm of sleep. 
Oh ! leave me pattern of that absolute heart 
That feeds thy courage with its iron blood, 
So I may face the future with a brow 
Laden with smiles, and be serene as thou. 

ClmrcJi. Dear one, dearer than ever now ! 

The forest is a glass where we may see 
The imperturbable God and learn His ways ; 
And while a ruby hand knocks at the heart, 
Fingers of hope should open it. Again 
I lay my parting on thy cheek and say. 
Farewell. 

Wenonah. I cannot teach my tongue that word: 
It locks my lips with dumbness. I could burn 
In the fierce flames of my relentless hate 
Those rebel syllables, that they no more 
Pillage my peace. 

Church. Sweet Seconet, thy will 

Is sovereign here ; mine can but humbly page 
The heels of thy desire. But see ! the dawn 
With amber feet is pacing up the east. 
And calls me laggard. 

Wenonah. No, 'tis not the dawn. 



36 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

But some belated meteor in his flight 
To trysting-place beneath the canopy 
Of purple gloom, with yon enraptured star 
Whose sapphire eyes beckon him gladly on. 

Church. To thee, my queen, I swear the night is 
young ; 
Those jealous streaks that hem the dress of day, 
But keener glances of night's sentinels 
Stretching their fiery necks to view on earth 
A perfect love. Be this my throne ! 

Wenonah, Never usurper fear ! 

Church. First fall the heavens ! 

Weapons, lie there ! or rather house your forms 
Deep in these sands ; for I subaltern am 
Only to love. 

[ Throws doivn his arms. 

Wenonah. A rarer strain is this 
Than the west wind for my tribe's Manitou, 
Harvests and puts away. 

Church. Never till now 

When beauty came in state, would my heart bow. 

Wenonah. That h apples me yet more, and pales 
the light 
Of all my fondest hopes : yet thou must go. 

Church. Be firm ! Turned is the tide, and the 
lithe waves 
Fawn at our feet ; so shall misfortune, too. 

Wenonah. Before I had not lived : if now — 

Church. Nay, clothed in this delight 

I am to paltry checks of mortal arm 
Intrenchant as the air. 

Wenonah. The village stirs ; the night 

Faints at the foot of day. In thine own hands ! 

\Picks up his anns. 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 37 

Church. My mission was forgot. 

Wcnonah. I have ensnared 

Thy resolution in the net of my fond words, 
And made thy will a by-word and naught else 
But mockery. Pardon my sin. 

Church. Oh ! such sweet sin 

Would tempt the angels from their banks of light 
To harp their songs to thee. 

Wcnonah. I think they have let down 

A mansion of delight where only bliss 
Is servitor to me. But touches it 
The thought that thou must go, it vanishes 
And all is dark again. 

Church. The scowling face of duty I will push 
Back in his cave — 

Wcnonah. No! linger thou must not 

Till the next wave foams on the shore. Away ! 
Over night's hills fast climbs the morning gray. 

Chui'ch. Alas ! that it should be intruding day ! 
I go, Wenonah, but in thought I stay. 

\Exit. WcyionaJi sinks in the door of the lodge. 



ACT II. 

SCENE I.— Plymouth. A room in Governor Wins- 
low's house. The walls covered with forest tro- 
phies ; in the centre of room a long table littered 
with letters, books, and maps. 

WiNSLOw, LoTHROP, and Mosely, seated. 

Wins/ozu. [Rt'szug:] Such is the child 
Of our diplomacy ! We bent on them 
The gracious smiling face, soothing their pride 
With gifts their rudeness loved. Our sacred book 
We sent into their huts, haply it might 
File down their spirits rough to deeds of peace, 
And knit our lives in amity's soft bands. 
When strong necessity hath ruled the hour 
Our weakness showed a visage masked in frowns. 
Their perfidy rebuking ; while our heart 
Trembled at face of its temerity. 
Nor have we feared to plunge the battle's gage 
Down at their feet, and risk the worst of fate, 
Though but a fringe on their great cloth of war. 
Rather than meekly yield to insolent threats 
That would uncrowm our prestige in their eyes, 
And send our mastery to wander in contempt. 
But all in vain ! This Philip's restless soul 
No threats may cower, no kindness may cajole : 
As darkness ever hangs on edge of light. 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 39 

So on our frontiers hang his imps of night 
Portending ruin. — Who knocks ? 

Enter Church. 

Our worthy scout ! Welcome ! 

Church. Would I bore news 

Were welcome too ! 

Winslow. Travel-stained thou art — thy face 

Shadows the vale of woe. 

Church. Dear Governor, 

Prepare thy mind for ill. 

Winslow. I feel what thou wouldst say : 

Peace droops her gentle head, for wolfish war 
His reddened fangs hath buried in her breast. 
But where hath Philip struck ? 

ChurcJi. At Metapoiset eight are dead ; 

And on the altars of their naked forms 
Cruel indignities the fiends have heaped : 
Their gashed and mangled bodies cast a damp 
Upon the dazed beholders — gory heads 
Stuck up on poles, glare fixed and stony eyes 
Mocking revenge dealt out to them who slew 
The convert Sassamon. 

Winslow. Oh, piteous sight ! 

Lothrop. Cunning Philip ! His patient craft 
Mousing pretexts to kindle war, pounced on 
That shadow of an injury to weave 
The jealous tribes in union, who till now 
Put on no strong desire to plunge them in 
His wild ambition's stream. Them we must teach ! 

Mosely. Captain, doth not this rising run 

Before the steps of Philip's plot ? I hear 
Mount Hope Wampanoags of corn in ground 



40 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

A thousand acres have, which policy 
Before the march of war would never plant 
For fire to reap. 

Church. Mosely, perchance our fears to hood- 
wink ; yet 
The Sachem's wiles or his credulity 
Recoiled from striking the initial blow : 
A whimsical opinion in their minds 
Dwells, victory's face at last would frown on them 
Who first shed blood. Therefore his orders ran, 
Plunder the Swanzey farms outlying ; maim, 
Drive to the woods, the cattle and the sheep, 
But not unless chided by bloody means 
Reply in tongue of death. A quarrel rose 
With a Pokanoket reeling in drink, 
And one into whose home he flung the flames : 
The savage bit the dust. Then all restraint 
Despair unleashed : the painted braves with hate 
Swollen, deeply their keen blood-hunger sate. 

Mosely. What tribes hath Philip welded to his 
cause ? 

Church. The Narragansets do espouse his war, 
Who bring a thousand warriors in the field : 
If good success shall perch on his first stroke 
The Nipmucks, Abenakis, and the hordes 
Peopling the shaggy forests of the north. 
Cement it with their strength. 

Winslow. Forsake us not, be captain to us, God ! 
Doomed are the settlements if thou thy face 
Avert, nor lead us with thy stretched-out hand ! 

Mosely. Do none of all the tribes 

Turn here a friendly face, or sit them down 
In wigwam of neutrality ? 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 4I 



Church. The Seconets, who count four hundred 
braves, 
Would not baptize this fearful child of war 
With their alliance ; the Mohegan chiefs 
Present at the war-dance, refused to grasp 
The hand of the rebellion, but withdrew, 
The plotted war condemning. 

Enter Oneko and Mohegan braves. 

Winslow. Neither by knock 

Announced, nor message, enter you ! 

Church. It is the forest mode. 

Oneko. Our father will forgive us, since we come 
Holding the branch of peace. 

Winslozv. Mohegan then ? 

Oneko. Oneko is my name ; and when I call 

Uncas my father, drink your ears a name 
With greatness goes. 

Winslozv. Honored it is, on our regard 

Grafted by many friendly acts. 

Oneko. Apaum, open thine ears : 

The anger of Pometacom is kindled 
Against his pale-face brothers ; it hath raised 
Tempests of war to desolate your towns : 
His braves will travel in that blood-soaked path, 
But Uncas and his children will not light 
The dread fire ; the chain of friendship they will 

keep 
Bright and unbroken. 

Winslow. We hold thee. Sagamore, 

In close affinity : gifts shalt thou bear 
To the great Chief whose many- wintered head 
With fame is bound, in token of our love. 
3 



42 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

But them who have awoke this sad contest, 
Such punishment awaits, and overthrow, 
Nothing more dire their Mitchi-Manitou 
Condemns below. And now our runners we will 

send 
To warn the colonists the die is cast, 
And misery plans a foray in the ranks 
Of their calm life. Thou, versed in Indian wiles, 

[To Church] 
Shalt take a company of Bradford's men, 
And with our veteran Mosely who hath seen 
War's face under Jamaica's eye of fire. 
Co-operate as the occasion's hand 
To best results may point. — Lothrop, thy years 
Are in their April leaf ; and hence I charge 
That thou on Church his long experience lean. 
And be a pupil in his forest art. 
Disputes about seniority of rank 
Must bow to the young peril of the hour 
Perchance shall blink the bold eye of your worth: 
The common weal relies on you. 

Church. Governor, in the fierce school of Indian 
arts 
A little I have learned : that little I 
Freely do offer to the colony's use. 

Winslotv. Thy modesty is equal to thy worth. — 

My friends, prepare to march at morrow's dawn. 

The Lord will be our shield, and great reward ; 

Our rock and our defence ; a cloud by day, 

A pillar of fire by night. — Braves, of your plans 

Something our enterprise would taste. 

[Exeunt. 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 43 

SCENE II. — The Connecticut Valley. A forest of 
oaks and yellow pines crossed by an Indian trail. 

Philip standing motionless beside a tree. Enter Anna- 
wan on stealthy foot ^ examining the ground. 

Philip. Is the trap set ? 
Annawan. Ready to spring. 

Enter Totatomet. 

Philip. This is our eye. — Thy haste is eloquent : 
They come this way ? 

Totatomet. See ! 

\He walks along like a tired person . 
The September sun 
Too fondly kisses them : the wagons groan 
Under heaps of red corn and new-made arms : 
Sleeps discipline. 

Philip. How many ? 

Totatomet. [Moves his hand rapidly around his 
head.] For each belt two. 

Philip. How far ? 

Totatomet. Pometacom, the distance have I run 
While drifted yonder cloud across the sun. 

Philip. Our genius lays its fatal hands on them ! 
A slender stream crosses the road below : 
Annawan, let twenty of thy best braves 
So post them that their aim command the ford : 
Myself will lead the onset on the flanks. 
The debt I owe thee, Seconet, will pay 
Our spoils of triumph in the coming fray. 
Away ! and watchful of the signal be : 
We'll drink again the wine of victory. 

[Exeunt, 



44 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

SCENE III. — The same. A road crossing a stream 
bordered with rocks. 

Enter Church, emerging from the forest. 

Church. At last ! 

If calculation in the scale of truth 
Were weighed, here should I meet the Hadley men; 
But the slack oxen and the staggering heat 
Their movements tie to slowness. I am warned 
By silent tongues to dread this expedition ; 
For more than once I stumbled on the trail 
Of prowling redskins, and I make no doubt 
War parties lurk them in these very woods. 
Lothrop is rash, and hath a heady will 
No hand of caution in a leash can hold : 
His Sugarloaf success unbonneted his pride 
So that it leaps at face of higher fortune. 
What's that ? The tramp of feet and wagons' roll 
Startle the drowsy air. I'll reconnoitre. \Exit. 

Enter Lothrop at head of troops, and Church, meeting. 

Church. Good-morrow, Captain. 

Lothrop, Well met, my hardy forester. 

I deemed thee many leagues away : what chance 
Conducts thee here ? 

Church. No chance but intent leads my steps. 
Apprised of thy design, a band of braves 
At night the river crossed, and by a march 
Rapid, are posted in thy van. 

Lothrop. Well, let them come. 

Church. What dost thou say ? 

Lothrop. I fear them not. 

Church, Consider this : 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 45 

Thy force is weak, unable to contend 
With the great arm of danger in thy path. 
Scouts I despatched to warn thee of the risk ; 
But they at Philip's hands have met their fate. 
Leaving with Mosely my command, I came 
Unheralded, to urge thee halt thy troops : 
By marches forced our veteran bands advance, 
And union is forerunner of success. 

LotJirop. Church, 

Thy trouble pays thee merely for thy pains. 
It is not like thy valor's lips will press, 
In this dull march, the bloody cheek of war. 
No Indian skulking in the silent aisles 
Of pine and oak, no trail of their swift feet, 
Have we descried since Deerfield from our sight 
In distance faded : Philip, victory- flushed, 
Under the larches of his native swamps 
Reposes, satisfied. 

Church. Pshaw! 

Thou art a 'prentice in his trade of war. 
I can set in thine eyes a commonplace 
Shall be the jailer of thy confidence. 
Seest thou this wintergreen with red cheek crushed. 
Sprawled on the ground ? Upon the hectic leaves 
That intoed print, proclaiming in this hour 
Red men have passed ? I would not buy your lives 
At a pin's worth when sets to-morrow's sun. 
Philip is like the vagrant wind : to-day 
Fast sleeping in the chambers of the south, 
The path of air unwounded by its tread ; 
To-morrow, a dark spirit from the north 
With lightning helmeted, and at his back 
Battalions of wild storm. 



46 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

LotJirop. Enough ! 

Fears from the purse of fancy, vain alarms, 
I borrow not. 

Church. So they at Wikabaug, 
Proud in their strength and thralls of confidence, 
Unqualitied, have in a bondage gone 
No price can ransom back. 

Lothrop. No more! Hang on my name 

A merited contempt if I retreat. 

Church. Better a wise retreat than overthrow. 

Lothrop, Wilt thou have done ? 

Church, My God ! 

Preserve at least a common vigilance. 
Never a scout thrown out to guard thy flanks ; 
Nor frowns at this disorder in the ranks 
An eye of discipline : precautions are 
Breast-plates to war, and half the victory win. 
Trust my experience ; for to him whose ways 
Are kin to redskin wiles this silence waves 
Signals of danger. Rather I believe 
Each tree will ope its brown and furrowed breast 
To thrust on our rapt gaze a host of foes, 
Than we in safety stand. 

Lothrop. Well, thou hast said : 

Doubtless thy fear is parent to thy thought. 

Church. No, boy, I never knew the name of fear: 
Its foot hath crossed the threshold of men's hearts, 
But never walked in mine. Self-satisfied, 
Live in the old darkness, and on thy morn 
Never a truth-star rise ! 

Lothrop. I know thee, Church. 

It is thine aim to gather in thy hands 
All power : no victories must be won save those 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 47 

Sanctioned by thee. I have the Essex men, 
The flower of valor, none of them ashamed 
To speak unto the enemy in the gate : 
Defeat will tlee before them. On ! on ! 

[ TJie inarch resumed. 

Enter a Soldier^ hastily. 

How now ! Thy face is white as any ghost's 
That roams through graves by night. What! dumb 
as death ? 

Enter a second Soldier. 

Canst thou speak ? 

[Yells arise on all sides accompanied by showers of 
arrows and reports of gtins.'] 

Second Soldier, The event outstrips my tongue. 
Church. An ambuscade ! Take to the trees ! 
Lothrop. I am struck. Oh, thou mine of wisdom 
rare ! 
This had not come if I had delved me there. 

[Exeunt in confusion, 

[ War whoops and shouts. Enter, fighting, whites and 
Indians ; then Church pursued by Totatomet.J 

Totatomet. Surrender, pale-face ! or thy life is 
bond 
Unto the next stroke of my tomahawk. 

Church. Villain, away ! I do not hold my life 
Subject to any arm on earth. 

Totatomet. White chief, no nimble heels 

May save thee, but my friendly wishes can. 



48 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

Church. In this good arm alone ! 

Totatoinet. Look round thee ! See on every hand 
The bodies of thy comrades choke the land 
With blood. Mine arms are drunk with it. Thy 

death 
Will not put in thy cause a single breath. 

Church. He talks to me as one who values life 
Begged from a foe in stress of mortal strife. 
Take from my path thy damned form ! 

Totatomet. Why not thou ? — 

I would tear out his flesh at the red stake 
Shred by shred. — Pale-face, the rose of Sogkonate 
Will wither at thy fall. 

Church, Thou demi-devil ! 

Dost thou think I will spend a word to buy 
Ages of captive breath ? Make way ! These slain 
Nerve me with their mute eloquence. 

Totatoinet. Through walls of foes 

Thy path to freedom lies. 

[They continue to fight. 

Enter Philip, Annawan, and braves, 

Philip. Who is it here dares live when we have 
set 
Death on his throne ? 
\Strikes down Church's arm, and the others secure him^ 
The pale-face Chief ! A prize worth all the rest ! 
Now guard him well. Smothered with victims is 
The mouth of death : reserve him for the stake. 

Totatoinet. A prize, Pometacom, a prize ! 
My hatred for his cup of torture cries. 
Philip, The pale-face pays my debt : the Chief 
is thine. — 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 49 

My braves, come round me ; let me see the joy 

That rides in your wild eyes, and through the paint 

On your high cheeks peeps forth in solemn smiles. 

This is the sovereign moment of your days, 

That crowns your acts with brass-enduring bays. 

Like the tornado launched from depths of space, 

Your bolts have fallen on this evil race ; 

And everywhere your glorious steps have trod 

The pale-face clasps in death the crimson sod. 

Already panic to their towns is fled ; 

And if at night " Wampanoag " be said. 

The hearts of bearded men knock at their side. 

As if the current of their veins were dried 

In the fierce sun of your immortaj hate,. 

And they that instant felt the stroke of fate. 

Now feast ye on the store of corn and wine 

This victory gives ; and to the sun divine 

Where dwells the Manitou in lodge of fire, 

Lift up your shouts for the confusion dire 

He hurls upon your enemies. The slain 

Shall fringe your belts with deeply valued gain 

Of scalps. What ho ! call in the straggling few : 

Much has been done, but much remains to do. 

Aiinawan, Sachem, 

Before thy face defeat muffles his own. 
As if thy glance had turned him into stone. 

Totatomet, And at thy side the form of victory 
flies 
To set thy name in glory's crimson skies. 

Warriors. Ugh ! ugh ! ugh ! 

Church. Philip, thy fortune like a rocket soars 
And dazzles every eye with keen success ; 
But in the puddle of defeat will fall. 



50 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

And sorrow's night will spread her wings o'er all. 
Lothrop is dead, and his companions brave 
Sleep in the dust ; but from their timeless grave 
Shall spring a spirit whose relentless hand 
Torrents of blood shall pour on thy doomed land 
In chastisement of this. 

Philip, What ye will do 

Is but a foetus in the womb of time, 
The midwife chance may never bring to life : 
What we have done is written on men's minds 
To live as long as they. — That other force 
Unnecessary breathes the air : despatch 
Braves to report their numbers and position : 
Your ceaseless hands must usher them below. 

[^Exeunt. 



SCENE IV.— SoGKONATE. The Seconet Village. En- 
ter in procession the Seconet squaws led by We- 
NONAH, crowned with leaves and bearing in their 
hands the bladed cornstalks ; they range in a circle, 
and sing to the music of rattle and drum beat by 
the medicine men. 

THE CORN SONG. 



When from the cave of winter creeps 
The month of leaves, and joyful leaps 

Nature at her new birth, 
We plant thee in the, mellow earth, 
Mondamin ! 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 5I 



The gentle dews sleep on thy bed ; 
And when thou liftst thy silken head 

To bathe in tides of day, 
Suns in pure gold thy limbs array, 
Mondamin ! 

3- 

When wave thy green plumes in the air. 
She, famed among the tribe most fair, 

Clothed in her naked charms. 
Weaves spells to guard thy life from harms, 
Mondamin ! 

4. 
At midnight hour she draws around 
Circles of magic on the ground, 
Wherein no mildew blight 
Hath power to pass, nor raven's flight, 
Mondamin ! 

5- 
And when the month of falling leaves 
Trees of their heritage bereaves, 

Maidens and young men strip 
The armor from thy golden hip, 
Mondamin ! 

6. 
Armor and spear to keep at bay 
Death and his squadrons of decay. 
While howls the winter wind : 
No friend like thee shall red men find, 
Mondamin ! 



52 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

Wenonah. Too many of our braves the foot of war 
Have followed ; in the pale-face eye it breaks 
Our glass of loyalty. But there is one 
No sentiment of honor, glory, pride, 
Can prod to battle's arms. Ho, Samponcut ! 

Samponcut. \Within.'\ Ah-oh-ee! 

Wenonah. Thou lazy bones. 

Unclasp the form of slumber, and come forth. 

Wanda. Unless thou notch a day 

On the lodge pole, he'll sleep and know no loss. 

Samponcut. [ Within.] Forbear, ye squaws ! 

Weno7iah. Sweet Samponcut, 

Divorce thine eyes from that proud sleep. See, the 

sun 
With rosy feet walks o'er the panting waves ! 
Wampum grows in thy belt to rise betimes. 
And drink the crystal stream of morning light. 

Enter Samponcut. 

Samponcut. What do I hear ? 

Divine wampum, present of the Manitou ! 
Born in the ocean, bred on earth to be 
Giver of all good things, I worship thee ! 

Wenonah. Think if thou wert a brave. 

And oared in glory's sea, thy hands would bear 
Fathoms of this resolute friend. 

[ Gives h im zua inp u m . 

Samponcut. Oh, perfect belt, I wear thee in my 
heart ! 
A servant thou, silent, tireless, and true. 
To do thy master's will. He shall but sit 
In his grim lodge, and thou wilt take the world 
Captive for him, and lay it at his feet. 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 53 

His ragged back thy purple hand will hang 
With the warm furs ; and to the ends of earth 
Travel to find, and down his stomach chase, 
All luscious things. 

Wenonah. No fruit in winter grows ! 

Fall on thy knees, and study there a prayer. 
If holy thoughts the cave of thy low mind 
May venture in. 

Samponcut. Why, why ? 

Wenonah. To teach thy joints, 

Wrapped up in folds of birch-fed venison. 
An honored path. 

Samponcut. I will experiment : 
Pray the white Chief buffet with fortune's arm 
The waves of war, and steer his bark of vows 
In harbor of fidelity. 

Wenonah. No, no, no ! If thou dost, 

Both he and I are lost : some other theme. 

Samponcut. First tell me, Sachemess, 

Why woman in her life the wide blue sea 
Resembles. 

Weno7iah. Because her heart is full of treasure. 

Samponcut. No reason there, Wenonah ; try , 
again. 

Wenonah. Oh, tell me in thy wisdom. 

Samponcut. Because it is 

Laden with craft. 

Enter Anumpash. 

Wenonah. A crafty answer. Look ! 

One back. Ah me ! What of Pometacom ? 

Anumpash. From triumph climbs to triumph, 
fresh and strong ; 
And dangers but salute and kneel to him. 



54 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

Wenonah. What new exploit 

On Squakeag treads ? 

AnumpasJi. Squaw, 

Not thrice the sun's unwearied foot hath trod 
That sapphire road, since he in ambush drew 
An Essex regiment, and planted it 
In death's sad field. 

Wenonah. Where ? 

Amimpash. In the Nipmuck land. 

Wenonah. Did none escape ? 
Anumpash. Upon thy fingers count 

Them who slipped through the reeking hand of 

slaughter 
Grown weary of its work. 
Weno7iaJi. My heart! 

Samponcut. Oh rare Pokanoket! 
Wenonah. Good Anumpash, 

Tell me one thing. 
Anumpash. Let the Squaw speak. 

Wenonah. The pale-face chief of Aquidneck — 
Thou knowest him ? 

Anumpash. Rugged he is, and tall. 

As oak to forest trees. 

Wenonah. Thou dost describe him well. 
Anumpash. He hath an eye 

In which the gloomy light of midnight waves 
Welters ; a brow whereon command doth sit ; 
And at his will no passion ever tugs. 
Wenonah. Well, doth he live ? 
Anumpash. His fortune did outscowl 

The eye of death : amid the balls that hailed 
Their crimson storm, the bounty of the skies 
Stood sentry to his life. 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 55 

Wenofiah. Good Anumpash, 

In my esteem thou art so richly clad 
No faults of thine peer out upon the world. 
And he escaped ? 

Aniimpash. Escaped I did not say. 

WenonaJu A captive then ? 

His freedom I will buy. 

AnumpasJi. A captive, ay, but— 

Wcnonah. Ha ! 

AnumpasJi. But — 

Wenonah. I'll have no But, for in my eye it is 
An tmrepentant rebel, in defeat 
Still plotting treason : let me hear it not. 

AnumpasJi. I wed my lips to silence. 

WenonaJi. Who bid thee that ? 

AnumpasJi. My Chief ! 

WenonaJi, Chain not thy tongue 

In silence' cell, but saddle it with words 
Of golden sound, and spur them in mine ear. 

AnumpasJi. Then first I must unpack my pres- 
ent tale 
And load my voice with fiction. 

WenonaJi. Thou dost forget. It is of Church 
I order thee to speak. Go on ! 

AnumpasJi. But this : in hand of our Totatomet 
The pale-face fell, and he is doomed to die. 

WenonaJi. How thy virtues fade 

In my opinion's sun ! A snow-man thou, 
The churlish hands of winter in a night 
On some charred stump fantastical had built, 
To fright pappooses merely. I ungird 
My good thoughts from thy name, and in the wind 
Of cold displeasure set it. Get thee gone ! 



56 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

Anumpash. Henceforth I speak the truth in 
dreams alone ; 
Never to women. \Exit. 

WenonaJi. That liar, is he gone ? 

Bid him return ! {Exit Wanda. 

His fortune had I gemmed 
With pearls of favor, had his speech been more 
Obedient to my wish. 

Samponcut. Why stand him in rebuke 

For others' deeds ? On patience lean. 

WenonaJi. He prates of patience who in fires of 
love 
Hath never burned ! Have I not seen and felt 
Raging their stream of hate in triumph^s hour ? 
The cruel honors paid to victory 
In the dull groan ere yet the spirit leaps 
Into that sea of night — the conqueror fire 
Loading endurance' back with pelts and traps 
Of unimagined woe that makes 
All other falling but a midnight sleep. 
Fast bound the prisoner stands so he can move 
No arm nor leg, nor scarce the body writhe 
When the rude arrows sow the shrinking flesh 
With seeds of agony. The hatchets fly 
Mindless to wound but lace the silver skin : 
As whizzes through the air the uncouth steel, 
The ecstasy of torture soars and soars ; 
And camps in every chamber of the nerves 
The mortal dew. Ages in minutes crowd, 
When it may chance some young unpractised hand 
With fatal aim will cast its tomahawk, 
Crashing it in the unprotected brain ; 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 57 

Then follow dismal yells as leap the braves 
In headlong rush to tear the quivering scalp 
Out at the roots. Oh ! oh ! oh ! 

Re-enter Wanda. 

Samponcut. What says the brave ? 

Wanda. He will not come. 

Samponcut. Where is he ? 

Wanda. In his lodge 

Oiling his locks with bear's grease, and his paint 
A-scraping off. 

Samponcut. Soon will he gorge and sleep. 

Wenonah. Leave him to sullen thoughts, 

And counsel me. 

Samponcut. Have I not heard a woman's tears 
Softened Powhatan ? To Pometacom 
Go : if his nature be not changed by war, 
For thee he will repeal this fiery law. 

Wenonah. I know he will; for under friend- 
ship's tree 
Our tribes have always dwelt. We waste the time. 
Quick, for my journey to Pokanoket 
Prepare the needful things ; and I will seek 
The Meda in his cave that he may shake 
His sacred rattles, and so exorcise 
Evil, and prosper my design. 

Samponcut. But wilt thou go alone ? 

Wenonah. Why not? I am the daughter of a 
chief, 
In hardships drilled and follower of grief ; 
And chartered as a warrior's chosen bride 
To tread the path of danger at his side. 

Samponcut. Force makes the better plea. 
4 



58 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

WenonaJi. Let fifty braves 

Camp on my trail. 

Samponcut. Totatomet must answer this. 

WenonaJi. If he escape the lightning blast, 
The heavens are guilty. 

[Exeunt all but Samponcut. 

Samponcut. That welkined love ! A hurricane 
it is 
Bends trees of opposition 'neath its breath, 
Tears up and flings aside all noxious growths 
Of thou-shalt-not that rankle in its path ; 
A flame in which each sort and class of men 
Melt in that lava state of doubt and hope, 
Elation, sorrow, that knock round the heart 
Unanchored like a shell on the free waves. 
No gibble-gabble for thee, friend Samponcut ! 
Shake thou the hand of time for that the snow 
Sprinkles thy hair, and all thy blood is cold : 
Else should some doting lead thee in the trap 
Set by the dimpled one, while lords of wit 
Fattened their gibes and sneers at thy weak legs 
Marched to and fro, here and there, up and down, 
To do the bidding of some tanned delight 
Who in the end might shake scorn's icy drops 
Upon the tender petals of thy love. \Exit. 



ACT III. 

SCENE I. PoKANOKET. The Wampanoag village. 

Rude music. Enter Philip, Annawan, Agamaug, Al- 
derman, Canonchet, Quinnapin, Monoko, Tuspa- 
QUiN, Tatoson, Pomham, and warriors with Church 
and other captives on one side ; on the other ^ Wam- 
panoag squaws headed by Wootonekanuske, chant- 
ing a scalp song. 

THE scalp song. 

I. 

See where the brave in triumph come 
Proudly to note of fife and drum, 

With firm, defiant tread : 
The crop of foes that grew around 
They sickled on a bloody ground, 

A harvest of the dead ! 

Hail to the hero band ! 
Pride of the Kinshon land. 
Who, valor hand in hand. 
Girded with glory stand. 

2. 

With scalps their girdles thick are hung \ 
Over their brawny shoulders flung 

The trophies of the slain : 
Rewards are theirs the noble prize ; 
And songs that climb the smiling skies 

In no penurious strain. 



6o PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

Hail ! hail ! the victors hail ! 
Braves shall in terror quail, 
Squaws shall for mercy wail, 
When ye your foes assail. 

3- 
But some in arms of death asleep 
Our fruitful eyes shall ever weep, 

And comfort strangled be ; 
For in their lodge deject and drear 
Famine will stalk with hideous leer. 

And life in anguish flee. 

Guard ye the desolate 
Beset by fires of fate ! 
So shall the Spirit Great 
Your triumphs vindicate. 

[Exeunt some of the braves leading the prison- 
ers, followed by squaws and pappooses who 
hoot and jeer them, and brandish knives and 
hatchets in their faces. 

Wootonekanuske. Pometacom ! 

Philip. My dear squaw ! 

Wootonekanuske. What joy 

Travels in my sad heart when I again 
Hang on thy lips, and raise these shadowed eyes 
Up in thy face. 

Philip. This moment pays the debt 

Of that poor time, and gives me a discharge 
. From regiment of grief. 

Wootonekajiuske, Yet could I drink 

Those bitter days again, to be but so. 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 6l 

Philip. Oneka, sorrows thou hast borne, 
Ills of so giant size my worst of days 
Were pigmies in their eye. Why did I feel 
Happy, when thou wert not ! 

Wootonekantiske. Dear Metacom, 

Give them no thought. 

Philip. Nay, speak ; 

For in my breast there roams no sentiment 
But turns at last to thee. 

Wootonekanuske. Driven from swamp to swamp, 
At night I lay me in a hollow tree ; 
Or crouching in the arms of savage rocks 
Where bears inhabit, wooed the fall of sleep 
To whelm my bark of cares. 

Philip. For every pang 

They racked thee on, Pometacom will lay 
A settlement in ashes. 

Wootonekanuske. For food I searched 
The fallen pines in net of slow decay 
Tangled, on whose black breast lift up their heads 
Red wintergreens, and beat into a pulp 
Plantain and dock, and scooped the crystal spring 
Washing the rock's mossed face, from famine's hand 
To lock my life. 

Philip. Heart of ruth ! 

In no hour when treading the sunless wilds. 
Bivouacked on star-lit hills, or victory's bowl 
Draining of blood, hath thy companionship 
Been absent from my mind. And now I come 
In triumph robed, and deafed with glory's voice 
That sets my fame on such a pinnacle. 
Oblivion's hand may never pull it down, — 
To bid a prouder fortune kneel to thee ; 



62 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

And every grain of care sown on thy brow 
Plough out with love. 

Wootonekanuske. To see this much-longed day 
When climbs thy wave on fortune's smiling shore, 
All sorrow that hath feasted on my heart, 
And all the future holds, chameleon-like, 
Changes to joy. 

Enter Metacomet. 

Philip. No more am I 

The servant of desire ! — Metacomet ! 
Let me peruse the volume of thy face. 
To learn the lines of mine when first a boy 
In rapture I did bend the sinewy bow 
To lance the cheek of air. It fathers me 
With a new joy, and with a pleasing fear. 
To hold thee in mine arms, and see thine eyes 
Flash in the light of mine. Where hast thou been ? 

Metacomet. In the black swamps. Sachem. 

Philip. What to do ? 

Metacomet. To lurk under the hemlock's shaggy 
arms, and shoot mine arrows at the dismal crows. 

Philip. Nor feared the Umpames ? 

Metacomet. A Wampanoag is not a brother to 
fear. 

PJiilip. My spirit dwells in thee ! The nation, 
boy. 
Will huddle all its honors on thy back. 
And chieftain thee, if thou wilt always spurn 
The knee of fear, and grow to my desire : 
A sachem shalt thou be, and at thy voice 
The forest tenantry will leap to arms. 
And every lodge untreasure. 

[ They retire apart. 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 63 

Quinnapin, Nay, nay, nay ! 

Monoko. I will wager my string of scalps to a 
bundle of rushes that the belly of his valor is so 
crammed with unbolted fears that on the next trail 
he will hug close the fireside of his lodge, and di- 
gest in the sun of idleness the perilous food of war 
thrust down the throat of his courage. 

Qiiinnapin. Thy string of scalps ! How many 
of them didst thou harvest in a foeman's skull ; 
and how many have since been halved and quar- 
tered by thy new device to take our admiration 
prisoner ? I would teach my tongue some discre- 
tion. 

Monoko. Teach thy lechery discretion ! Then 
wilt thou not be chased out of a mistaken lodge by 
an irate brave, and be forced to swear thou camest 
by thy wounds in a midnight skirmish with the 
pale-faces, to thread the eye of thy squaw's suspi- 
cions. 

Quimtapin. May the Great Spirit hear him ! Thy 
face alone would strip a wigwam of its inmates, 
by merely peering under the deerskin : nothing 
shall you see there to subdue the virtue of our 
squaws. 

Annawan. Nushkah ! these pestilent knaves 
will quarrel with their own shadows ; with the im- 
pertinent wind because it drops a leaf upon the for- 
est trail ; with the golden-rod because its color does 
not match the sky. An Pometacom slap not the 
face of occasion and give them the cud of another 
war to chew upon, their blood will chafe these 
banks of idleness till it overflow our peace in con- 
stant broils. 



64 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

Monoko. A war for him, my father ! No ! he 
holds his blood too precious to smear that fluid on 
the arm of valor. Let a mosquito but sluice out 
of his veins a rivulet of red, he bellows like a calf 
and blubbers that his last hour is come. 

Alderman. It was the only cloud 

On victory's sky. Say how it fell. 

Agamaug. It came about in this way. Many of 
the Nipmucks stood aloof, and dieted their love of 
Pometacom with fears of the various bodies of 
pale-faces stationed on the river : they dreaded 
that his good fortune would stumble in so steep an 
enterprise. But when Squakeag had stooped the 
head of defiance ; when Deerfield had been gar- 
mented in flames, and bands of whites in all direc- 
tions ambushed and cut to pieces, then the Nip- 
muck chiefs no longer drank the fountain of neu- 
trality. They dug up the hatchet ; unbarred their 
gate to three hundred of our braves : we trod in 
thought on ruins of Springfield. That flower blos- 
somed not : the icy hand of treachery untimely 
nipped the bud of our project. Toto — whose name 
be buried in the grave of infamy ! — revealed the 
plot : our torrent beat against their garrison in vain. 
But fire betrayed us not : their homes and barns 
were clasped to its red breast, and that did com- 
fort us. 

Alderman. Yet say that Toto for his fit reward 
Sups in the dust. 

Agamaug. His face is yet 

Familiar with the sun. 

Canonchet. Is there no hand in service to the cry 
Age-honored, that a renegade must die ? 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 65 

Poniham. Had I his throat between these hands 
of mine, 
With Mitchi-Manitou the wretch would dine. 
Tuspaquin. Within his lodge come never veni- 
son ; 
No wampum breed beneath his guilty hand ; 
Nor age camp on his brow ! 

Tatoson. But vengeance shall outstrip the trai- 
tor's crime, 
Though it may travel slow and take its time ; 
And even while the messenger delays 
Remorse still on the villain's conscience preys ; 
For in his mind a thousand deaths he dies. 
Ere to his heart the fatal arrow flies. 

Qiiinnapin. I would the conscience of that Nip- 
muck should upbraid him for the enticement of 
much wampum out of my wigwam, the which I 
loved as the she-bear loves her cubs ; but if such 
stalk grew in his soil, it hath been thrice wilted 
in the sun of depravity till there is no unshrivelled 
arm to hang a good resolution on. 

Monoko. My heart is the same color as my face. 
His only friends are the population of his hair 
whom he petitions with his nails to visit his stom- 
ach : he fears to hunt his food. 

Annazvan. The marrow burn your bones ! Will 
ye ever rub the sore of your disputes with words, 
words, words ! 

Philip. Be ever pupil to those valiant thoughts ! 
But see, the chiefs ! 

Canonchet. Pometacom, 

The sun behind the rosy clouds of eve 
Stables his golden steeds, and bids us go. 



66 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

Philip. Have ye the spoil 

Parted ? Is each one satisfied ? For then, 
Feed on my share. 

Canonchet. If our desires 

Had swelled like mountain brooks in April time, 
Thy bounty would have dwarfed them all. 

Philip. It tries to reach to your deserts. 

Yet words of praise but limp behind your deeds, 
Too slow to overtake them. In the face 
Of giant wrongs you threw rebellion's glove ; 
And though your steps were tangled in the fears 
Thick-growing in the hearts of lukewarm tribes ; 
Though discipline was weeded from your ranks 
By liberty's rough hand, and treachery's teeth 
Mangled the form of darling enterprise ; 
Yet over all your active courage climbed. 
And on the hills and peaks of victory 
Planted your arms. 

Warriors. Ugh ! ugh ! ugh ! 

Pomham. Chief, to our lodges we will take 
These bright-haired scalps, and on their tresses 

read. 
In lines of fire, triumphs to come. 

Quinnapin. What sayest thou ? Survives a sad- 
eyed white 
Monoko's hand plunged not in endless night ? 

Monoko. Pometacom, he swims in mirth, 
But on the war-path, nothing worth. — 
Pray for a magic wand in a tree's rind 
Viewless to render thee when the braves chant 
The mortal song. 

Philip. Brothers, not all that human field 
Have ye yet reaped. The conquests ye have made 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 67 

Are garrisoned by ruin, your captives bound 
In silent forts of death : them that yet live, 
Whose breathing yet offends the sacred air. 
We next push in the sea. 

Warriors. Ugh ! ugh ! ugh ! 

Philip. As thunder drops 

On guilty heads, and sullen stalks away, 
Its mission ended, ye have scourged your foes 
As swift and terrible. Your fathers' bones 
Gloat in their shrouds of clay ; and where he dwells 
In undecaying lodge, the Manitou 
Smiles, well-contented, on his children's deeds. 
But if be born a time when enterprise 
Stumbles in path of unity, defeat. 
Black-browed, will rise and tear out of your hands 
The fruit of former toils. Be sure, my braves, 
Our freedom is begirt with loose decay, 
If faction quarrel with authority. 
The snake of discord throttle at its birth. 
Lest it shall grow a monster in whose sting 
Poison resides to canker up the blood. 
And choke the swelling veins of sovereign sway. 
Our cause diseasing. On that golden face 
Lives no reproach. If, moccasined with flame. 
He lead us back the pleasant month of leaves, 
And see you perfect, over this forest realm 
Where pale-faces unkennel dogs of change, 
I swear the red man shall forever range. 

Warriors. Mugwump! Mugwump! Mugwump! 

Canonchet. Wampanoag, thou art a man 

Whose words and deeds have ever kept abreast. 
When left the sun his wigwam in the south 
And travelled north, he saw a hundred towns 



68 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

Where dwelt the whites in happiness and power. 
Now where he casts his eye he but beholds 
Ruin and death. We have not streng-th to bear 
Our heavy pole of scalps ; no more for blood 
Our hatchets thirst. Yet as it is thy will, 
We drive revenges in our mind again. 

Philip. Canonchet, 

Our foot hath merely bruised the serpent's head : 
He'll coil him up, and strike his venomed fang. 
The deer will not come back where pale-face smoke 
Sullies the sky, and lays the forest low. 
But oil your bow strings in the shrouded light 
Of six more moons, that so your steps may roam 
In freedom over every hill and dale. 

Ca7i07ichet. It is our only wish. 

[Exeunt all but Philip, Annawan, Wootone- 
KANUSKE, and Metacomet. 

Annawan. Pometacom, 

When shall we bring that pale-face to the stake ? 

Philip. Not now, good Annawan. I find my 
heart 
Swimming in tide of gentle thoughts, to bank 
Of deep content. Leave him awhile. 

Ajtnazvajt, To-morrow it shall be. His life 
offends 
The eye of my delight. 

Philip. Nay, let us cool our hate 

With moderation's breath. Have we not all ? 
Oneka, come ! \Exeiint. 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. * 69 

SCENE II. — SoGKONATE. A cove partly sheltered by 
a thin clump of low pines. 

Samponcut, fitting out a canoe. 

Samponcut. No spirits in the bold light of these 
days 
Travel the earth to do their weary tasks 
When men are sleeping ! 

These are dainties fit 
For one enskyed. No snails and earth worms 

mashed 
In a vile jelly which your Puritan 
Crams down his children's throat, but viands fair, 
Tribute of land and sea. White oysters there, , 
Fattened in the still depths by ocean's hand ; 
Here, sober clams that carry on their back 
A house of purple shell ; sand-loving snipe ; 
Ear-corn roasted in ashes of red oak. 
But she's in love, and not a morsel sweet 
Will pass her lips. 

Enter Totatomet. 

Now the Manitou 
Unknits his brow ! 

Totatomet, It drives 

Grief from the bosom of Totatomet, 
To grasp this wrist again. 

Samponcut. Dwell I in lodge of dream . 

With all thy limbs intact ! No, not a wound 
The magic of proud victory hath not healed, 
Ere yet the notes of battle died on air. 
These pledges to thy worth an homage pay, 
And hem thy belt with glory. One, two, four, 



70 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

Six, eight, ten ! Pride of the Seconets, 

While parched our lives in their inglorious bower, 

Thy fortune sprouted in a golden shower. 

Totatomet. Father, 

It washed our hands with riches. 

Samponcut. That Chief ! 

His wondrous story mocks a meda's tale 
Told by the fire. Reports of your success 
Followed upon each other's heels so fast, 
Before our wonder could digest the first 
A next would choke its throat. 

Totatomet. Ay, Samponcut, it was as though 

Mischance were lamed and limped behind, or fell 
Before his glance ; as if desiring food 
We had but shot our arrows in the air, 
Aimless and wild, and lo ! the unseen deer 
Panted on earth. 

Samponcut. My matchless* brave ! But in thine 
eye 
What dulness dwells. Still dost thou stagger 
there ? 

Totatomet, Dear Samponcut, 

I plunged into this war as in a sea 
To drown those thoughts ; but faithful memory 
Will ever pluck them up. How fares the Squaw ? 

Samponcut, How did the Red Swan fare 
When in her breast the magic arrow flew ? 

Totatomet, I follow not. 

Samponcut, Deeply she pines 

Since fortune to captivity betrayed 
The whiskered one. 

Totatomet. Her thoughts still hold a truce with 
him ! 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 7I 

Samponcut. Ay, in her bay of love 

His vessel rides, so sheltered and secure. 
No wave of separation, no wind of time. 
May drive it hence. 

Totatomet. But I will raise a storm 

Shall shatter on the shoals and rocks of grief 
Her and her utmost hopes. Mine she must be. 

Samponcut. Exile the wish ! The Sachemess is 
proud. 
Stubborn, and hath a will not to be mined 
By thy desires. 

Totatomet. Ride to death 

Thy quibbles, Samponcut : in serious path 
Journeys my thought. From youth thou knowest 

me : 
Grew aught on branch of possibility 
But I did climb to it ? 

Sampoiicut. Nay, failure doth not grow 

Under thy clime — I mean, it is not writ 
In any wampum thine. Unfold thy plan. 

Totatomet. Walk then in the straight path. 

A prisoner in my hands the pale-face lies. 
Yoked to his new offence of loving her, 
An ancient grudge I bear him from a suit 
Growing, in Plymouth to recover lands 
Beguiled from me when drink had made my mind 
Captive to folly ; and I hate him now 
Doubly, for that by liked gifts and by words 
More eloquent than in my tongue reside, 
The favor in Wenonah's eyes I held. 
He throws a tarnish on. Pometacom 
Is friendly to my purpose he shall burn 
In triple fires. If yet he drinks the air 



72 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

'Tis SO I may wring from that beauty's heart 
Cold drops of horror, and behold her face 
Droop in despair when I make known his fate 
Beyond reprieve, ere thrice that golden foot 
Treads the soft blue, his limbs are clad in death. 

Samponcut. But she knows this, 

For Anumpash is here, and hath revealed 
Thy dismal plans. And so, at her command, 
Freighted is this canoe to bear her soon 
Hence to Pokanoket, when she will melt 
The Sachem's heart with pity and remorse 
To free the white. 

Totatomet. Ha! is it so ? Quick ! bring me where 
Her summer wigwam stands. 

Samponcut. Not I, sweet Seconet ! 

But if thy courage would her fury brave, 
When evening falls seek thou Pambassa's cave. 
She goes to test the holy Meda's skill 
Within the future's book to read the will 
Of the Great Spirit. 

Totatomet. It is full an hour 

Before the wearied warrior of the sky 
Takes off his gleaming arms. Until that time, 
At thy good board, thy company shall lend 
Mine ear discourse of the events that fell 
While I beneath the Nipmuck skies did dwell. 
Samponcut. Why, to be sure ! No more are we 
content 
To feed on fame alone ! {Exeunt. 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 73 

SCENE III— SoGKONATE. The Cave of Pambassa, 
its rocky walls hung with pipes, rattles, and medi- 
cine bags. On one side a gourd lamp on a shelf of 
stone ; on the other, a couch of skins. 

Enter Totatomet. 

Totatomet. I am in time. The night is pure 
serene ; 
Her darkling form swims through the tides of space 
With gentlest motion. On the heaving waves, 
With silver feet, the moon in beauty walks. 
Down in her cataract of splendor sink 
The dwindled lanterns of the common stars. 
Which in her absence hang their solemn lights 
On heaven's ramparts. So doth every grace 
Blink its weak eye before Wenonah's face. 
The lord of light in his long march on high, 
Never hath seen a creature that can vie 
On terms with her. And shall the pale-face snatch 
Those charms no beauty of his race can match ? 
Out of these veins let hooded vampires sluice 
My molten blood, unto my soul lay siege 
Hosts of dismay, battalions of remorse. 
When I forbid it not. — 

Pambassa, ho ! — 
I had thought to tread out this flame, and make 
A counsellor of pride, but absence fed 
Still more the wasting fire. My Manitou ! 
I have him in my power. At my command 
Wanders his shadow in the spirit land. — 

What ho ! Pambassa, ho ! — 
He sleeps — 'tis well. In the uncertain light 
This moss like snowy locks will seem ; his robe 
5 



74 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

That wrapped the Meda's form ere I was born, 
Will speak of him — so, so. Now if I use 
A halting gait, and let a rasping cough 
Dwell in my throat — uh, uh, uh — that will do. 
But hark ! a step upbraids the quiet night. 
Down on those skins beyond the flickering light. 
Uh, uh, uh ! 

Enter Wenonah. 

Wenonah. Pambassa, art thou here ? 

Totatomet. Who thus disturbs 

The slumbers of a dying man ? Uh, uh, uh ! 

Wenonah. I am Wenonah, and it grieves my 
heart 
Thou art unwell. In pity of thy state, 
I have hung at thy door a wampum belt 
Shall purchase thee all simples of the woods, 
To lead thee back to health. 

Totatomet, I know thee now, 

And thank this malady that sets ajar 
The door of death, that so these fading eyes 
Born in the glory of my Sogkonate, 
May never see its fall. Uh, uh, uh ! 

Weno7iah. So strange thy words, 

I know them not. 

Totatomet. Art thou not she 
Who, by alliance with the pale-face race 
Red men divorce forever from their love. 
Hath bathed the honors of the Seconets 
In river of disgrace ? 

Wenonah. Listen, Pambassa. 

Totatomet. I do remember thee. Thou art the 
one 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 75 

Whose love is of a quality so strang-e, 
It could not harbor in our native stream, 
But journeyed far in quest of new delights, 
And feasted on a foe. 

Wenonah. Should such a charge 

Go with my life ? 

Totatomet. Thou wilt deny it not. 

The thunder birds are angry, and the crow 
Caws from the blasted pine his dismal note. 
When rose the voice of the Wampanoag 
Horsed on the blasts of war, and the stern tribes 
It marshalled to the conflict followed on, 
Like wave to wave, the hand that should have led. 
Turned back the current of our discontent 

In the scum pool of peace. What dost thou here ? 
Wenonah. Father, thou art ill. 

A dark spirit hath entered in thy breast. 

And robbed thee of thy voice and thine old ways ; 

For both of them to what I knew them once, 
Are of no kin. 

Totatomet. Uh, uh, uh, uh ! 

'Tis thou art changed— not I. 

Daughter, I love thee. When I love thee not, 

These ninety years, the mellow fruit of time. 

Drop in the mouth of death ! But hearken thou : 

The ear of ancient manners is abused 

By thy new life. 

Before, thou wert a votaress of my praise, . 

Drinking my counsel as the leaf the dew ; 

But now a strangeness hath unknit the coil 

That bound unto my holy oracles 

Thy patient days. 

A snake hath slyly crept amid our tribe, 



76 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

Leaving the slime of his detested thoughts 
To smear the tender blade of thy resolves. 
His forked tongue a venom hath distilled 
Into thy mind to make it loathe our ways, 
And lead it 'neath the roof of foreign laws, 
The Seconets condemning. 

Wenonah. If I have erred. 

In love of Sogkonate I did it all. 

Totatomet. With duty's show 

We often fringe the cloak of our desires. 

Wenonah. Ah, pity me ! 

I am unhappy, father, and I came 
Thy counsel to implore. The pale-face chief 
Is growing in the garden of my heart : 
Remonstrances are vain to tear him out 
My soil ot love. But now misfortune's hand 
Delivers him to the Wampanoag 
Whose sea of hate will swallow up his life. 
If thou hast ever held my totem dear, 
Pray that I may redeem him from the fire. 

Totatomet. My child, 

Seek not to change the Manitou's design. 
Nay, bid me rattle the harsh gourd and sing 
Ha-he-hi-hah, and exorcise thine imp ; 
Or make of him a figure in pine bark. 
And place it at the door for our young men 
To shoot their arrows at. Shake off this love. 
Curb not the fiery heart of Sogkonate 
Whose spirit frets against these bars of peace. 
And censures thee. Say to that alien race 
That urges thee to stab our brother's hope. 
Ye milk the ram, and to you we can be 
But instruments of death. From thy thought's wall 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 77 

Tear down the image of that soon-no-more 
Pale-face who turned thy reason inside out, 
Dressing the worst in garb of the best cause ; 
And in thy favor hang that brave of braves, 
Totatomet. The god is speaking. 

Wenonah. Methinks a devil speaks, and not a god. 
The frayed and ravelled suit of him whose name 
Never again will march upon my tongue, 
Is cast off, and no words may weave it up. 
I would abhor to lay on me a yoke 
So to subdue the resolute heart I bear. 
My soul is free as air, and as the sea 
Boundless, and ever shall its love bestow. 
False priest, on whom it please, and when, and 
where. 

Totatomet. Poison that in the mandrake 

Dwells, blow thy blood ! Now patience from my 

breast 
Exiled shall be ; and on thy desperate will 
Ride rude command. Know I am one 

[ Throwing off his disguise. 
Whose enterprise bends not its stately head 
To foot of faltering. Squaw, to my lodge 
Now thou must go ! 

Wenonah. [Recoils in horror.] Totatomet ! 

Totatomet. Think not to 'scape my hand. 

I have in this the warrant of the tribe ; 
And thy disdain shall balk it not. 

Wenonah. Back ! back ! I say, unworthy Seco- 
net ; 
And with no touch profane me. 

Totatomet. Yield thee, Squaw. 



^8 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

Chafe not the swollen current of my blood 
Which else shall break in fury through thy bar. 

Wenonah. Brave, art thou mad ? 

Put up thy knife, or turn it on thyself. 
Such treason's grim arid old-time penalty. 

\He shrinks back overawed by her looks. 
Ay, let it search the caverns of thy breast 
With murderous hands, and where it finds thy 

heart 
House in it deep as death. I fear thee not. 

Totatomet. Then fear for him, the jewel of thy 
soul 
Torn from its prosperous setting by my hand. 
Deep shalt thou drain the hot and bitter cup 
Thy folly brews, while the face of thy proud 

thoughts 
Grovels in ashes of remorse. Bethink, 
My haughty Squaw, now lighted is the fire 
Whose crimson jaws all greedy shall lick up 
His sizzling stream of flesh. I will be there ; 
And I will teach the eager knots of pine 
The lexicon of hate from A to Z, 
So anguish on him peer with hellish looks ; 
And tell him she who flattered him with love, 
Is author of his woe. Proud woman-chief. 
Already do I hear, and so mayst thou. 
The groans that split his heart, and drag it down 
Abysses of despair and gulfs of woe. 
Till it shall riot in such agony, 
In wildness and in frenzy he will call 
The still and gracious death. \Exit, 

Wenonah. What have I done ? 

Betrayed him to his death ? No, no, no, no ! 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 79 

Fetters that Seconet can never forge 
My credit with the great Chief may not break. 
His threats but arm me in my new design 
With stronger resolution. I will pray 
That all is well, but oh ! how cold 'tis here. 
Ere the Great Bear under the starry pole 
Crouches, I must be gone. Pometacom 
When he struck the war-post did never bid 
Farewell to mercy. Under his cold mien 
A lenient nature flows. He will stamp out 
The cruelty of the other. — Samponcut ! — 
No monsters lurk in the dark ocean caves 
Fierce as a lover scorned. — Ho, Samponcut ! 

[Exit, 



ACT IV. 

SCENE I. — PoKANOKET. The Wampanoag" village. A 
council of chiefs : Annawan, Tuspaquin, Tatoson, 
Alderman, and Agamaug. Braves and squaws. 

Annawmi, Where is the Seconet ? 

Agamaug. The path between your village and 
his lodge 
Is not a short one, Annawan. 

Annawan, He should be here to taint 

This rawest fancy of Pometacom 
With a hot opposition. 

Tuspaquin. Nay, let the Sachem pluck 

This plume from mercy's wing : enough remains. 

Annawan, Nushkah ! had I my wish at one 

black stake 
Would I bind every white whose foot hath scorched 
The red man's land, upon the wings of flame 
Waft them away. 

Alderman. The Sachem's heart is soft : 
When mercy knocks his kindness takes her in. 

Annawan. I wish to die before my heart is soft. 
He is the bravest, wisest of the whites, . 
And his escape revives the drooping stalk 
Of their bad cause. Only his death can bolt 
Our door of safety. 

Enter Philip. 

Tatoson. The Sachem comes. 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 8l 

Philip. All hath been settled save the fate of him 
Whose valor anchors in our stream of love 
His forfeit life. Kekamah, bring him in ! 

\Exit a brave, 
I think thee, Alderm.an, thy brother's shade : 
The grave alone can part you. 

Alderman. No, my chief, 

Not even that. 

Philip. Hi, hi, your friendship's eye 

Outstares the love of women. — 

Church is led i^i. 

Set him there ! Chiefs. 



If he will bolster up his wounded lot 

With pillow of our life, shall we refuse 

To taste the fruit ?— 

Pale-face, what hath thy dauntless soul to say 

Why 'death should not inherit now thy clay ? 

Church. It is the chance of war : I ani content. 

Philip. Thy heart is brave, never to danger 
bent. 
Foremost in ranks of battle hast thou fought ; 
And in life's sea the pearl of honor sought. 
That life, unlike thy false perfidious race, 
The garment of an honest heart doth lace ; 
And though thy musket hath our death-song sung, 
Our justice grants thou art no double-tongue. 

Church, Philip, I thank thee. If my race be 
run. 
Dying, I own in fairest combat won. 

Philip. White Chief, 

Large ransom hath been offered for thy life 
Won by Totatomet in equal strife ; 



S2 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

But he, choked by the fumes of hatred deep, 
Freely can breathe but in thine endless sleep. 
His prisoner thou ; but means are in my power, 
If so I will, to stay thy fatal hour. 

Church. I listen to thy words, Wampanoag. 

Philip. Pale-face, 

The red man's life is dignified and free : 
We worship one above and — liberty. 
Our forest towns no moats, no ramparts pen ; 
But guarded by a living wall of men 
They stand. Our streets no thieves, no beggars 

tread. 
In our domain no jail lifts up its head. 
For others' ease no lowly classes toil : 
All live joint tenants of the common soil. 

Warriors. Ugh ! ugh ! ugh ! 

Philip. Pale-face, 

The sickle of this war hath mowed our braves 
In swaths of blood down to their timeless graves ; 
But not in vain— never, I say, in vain : 
For where their forms stalk through the sullen 

tomb. 
Four pale-face spirits glad them in the gloom. 
We welcome to our ranks the manly heart 
Who at our feast of glory craves a part. 
Thine is an arm in valor's eye so dear. 
Our tribes give it the worship of their fear. 
In this wide world thou standest now alone, 
Thy fate in hands where mercy is unknown. 
But shall we squander in the greedy grave 
The wealth of prowess would our fortunes lave 
In triumph's sea, enlisted in our cause ? 
Or shall we say : submit thee to our laws ; 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 83 

Come to our lodges, free, embrace our life ; 
Among our black-haired daughters take a wife : 
A chieftain be, and at our council-fire 
Hear thy voice honored like the tribal sire ? 

[^Confused cries from the band, some in approval, others 
in opposition^ 

Annawan. Cram down his throat 

A fist of dust ! 

Philip. A cup of calmness drain ! — 

Pale-face, bethink thee if our mercy throw 
This rope of safety, wouldst thou clutch at it ? 

Church. What's that ? 

Wandered my thoughts in fields of happier days. 
If it be nothing that will strip my faith 
Naked to the world's shrewd blast, I will lead 
Mine inclinations in it. 

Philip. Thou must become as one of us. 

Each fort of old affection and regard' 
Must be dismantled^ and forgetfulness 
Creep over them ; thy zeal and purposes 
Cry " Hail " to our resolves ; what we decide 
Graft on thy will ; say to thy former self 
A last good-night ; and all the freight of hope 
Thy bosom bears, land on our shore. 

Church. Ha ! ha ! ha ! 

Philip, Why dost thou laugh ? 

Church. And if I say : 

Pokanoket, I will do this, and so 
Hoodwink suspicion, till I pluck a chance 
Out of occasion's hand to shake thy dust 
From off my feet, shall I not then be free ? 



§4 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

Philip, The penalty is death 
But to attempt it. 

Church, Lip-service is not mine. 

Philip, I cannot marry to thy tribe 
Warring- with mine and in their curses set, 
My true devotion. Let it end. 

Philip. Pale-face, on no slight cause 

Pull down thy mortal house. 

Church. Tempter, away ! Should I with dull 
apostasy 
Mangle my early creed, baptize mine arms 
Most foully in my dear companions' blood, 
Would they not set a stigma on my name. 
And shake my memory from their branch of love ? 
Or if they should condone my deepest fall, 
And dredge mine honor out of treason's sea, 
How shall I answer to the inward voice ? 
Can I flee from it to the haunts of men ; 
Or in the noblest school of solitude 
Plead poverty of will ? All would be vain ! 
It would pursue me with unflagging step 
Around the earth ; embitter every hour ; 
And make a grave seem gentle place of rest. 
Teach me another way. 

Enter Totatomet. 

■ Philip. I know of none. 

Totatomet. Come, let the fire 

Feel for his heart. 

Philip. Art thou resolved 

To court this darkness ? 

Church, I think of what I am, 

Sachem, and it forbids my faltering now. 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 85 

Hast thou not heard, I have a vow in heaven 

Recorded in the angel's book where I 

Turn every day my thought to read it there. 

That oath was sworn above the mangled forms 

Of all my dear below, where they were found 

In ruins of our home, the satan work 

Of redskins such as ye, when they let loose 

Hell on the earth. If I a compact seal 

With thy destruction, from these sides would rot 

Mine arms forsworn, and on my perjured head 

The lightning fall. No, Philip, no ! 

Alderman. If Providence hath no spies out. 
Minutes may span his rivulet of life. 

Agamaug. I see his limbs 

Mantled in fire. 

Annaivan. I thank the Manitou 
I see this day, if it be so ! 

Church. Oh Sogkonate ! what happiness 
Circled thy name !— No, Philip, I may not 
Unclothe my character to that bleak change. 
Thou mayst but try me to my fall, then pour 
Contempt and laughter on me. I will strive 
To guide me by the chart the rarest use 
In desert of our life ; cling to my cross, 
Clad in a mood that throttles accidents 
And binds the feet of change. 

Philip. Thou must not say 

I jested with thy state ; but if thou mask 
Under this choice a purpose to escape. 
Strangle the thought. Yet if thou hast to ask 
Aught that the gorge and stomach of our place 
May not strain at, let me but hear. 

Church. My fortune has not run, Wampanoag, 



86 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

Along with thine, but stumbled by the way. 

Renown and triumph wait upon thy steps, 

And flatter thee with visions of a time 

When all the settlements shall prostrate lie 

Ruined, beneath thine arm ; the thirsty earth 

Lap up the blood of the last colonist ; 

While o'er the sites where they have reared their 

homes. 
The green foot of the old primeval woods 
In silence creeps. Sachem, let not thy thought 
Follow such false trail, an unskilled hunter there. 
Soon is this voice the bride of silence ; hence 
A prophecy sits in my final words : 
The Saxon face is set against the sun, 
And follows where his golden steeds do run. 
Disasters have but built our purpose strong 
Rather to perish than submit to wrong. 
Yet have we not put forth our latent power ; 
The lion in us hath not had his hour ; 
But when we rise in all our might of wrath 
Swept are our foes like chaff before our path. 

Annawan. Thy boasting now ! 

Warriors. To the stake ! to the stake ! 

Philip. Thy weakness shall be passport to thy 
tongue 
To pass the sentinel of modest doubt. 
Pale-face, I friended thee and put a staff 
Into thy hands to lead thee out of death ; 
But thou hast held thee on a different way. 
Saluting not the face of my design. 
The braves they say thy life is forfeited. 
No fault is mine : thy blood be on thy head ! 

Warriors. To the stake ! to the stake ! 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 87 

Church. Words will but spend my fleeting 
breath in vain. 
A renegade, my name would die amain ; 
But dying faithful it shall live again. 

\^Exit^ between the guards. 
Philip. Totatomet, be thine to set the stake. 
Brave Seconet, much do we owe thine arm : 
To-night thy hate embraces its revenge. 

Totatomet. Thy thanks do set a glory on my 
deeds. \Exeunt, 



SC^NE II. — PoKANOKET. Au Open space in the centre 
of the Wampanoag village, with a stake set up sur- 
rounded by fagots and brushwood. Time, night ; 
around, pine knots throw a lurid light. 

Enter Philip, Annawan, Totatomet, Tatoson, Aga- 
MAUG, Alderman, warriors and squaws. 

Philip. Nay, policy was parent of that wish : 
So true a branch engrafted on our tree 
Had dropped us fruit of choicest victory. 

Annawan. Better this way. The braves for 
vengeance cry, 
And with one voice demand the pale-face die. 
The red men's blood his ruthless hand hath shed 
Forms in a cloud to burst upon his head ; 
And freer shall we breathe when such a foe, 
Harmless for aye, sits with the shades below. 

Philip. It likes me not to bathe in useless blood. 
To no man will my mounting spirit yield 
When battle rages in the crimson field ; 



88 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

But when his wings are drooped in victory, 

From savage thoughts my mind is purged and free. 

Annawan, Pometacom, 

Wilt thou not own this gift is due thy tribe ; 
And due the allies who have spent their blood 
To purchase thee dominion ? 

Philip. Good Annawan, 

Their minds dyed in the vat of our fierce trade, 
Hold not the scales in which my thoughts are 

weighed. 
The present moment bounds their little day, 
Moulding their souls beneath its tyrant sway. 

Annawan. Hast thou forgot how oft the whites 
betrayed 
The character of justice they parade ? 
Our braves when captured in the stricken field. 
Do they to mercy or to ransom yield ? 
Ask of the winds that kiss the trunkless heads 
Grimly their hellish hands nail up on poles 
To guard the reeking gates of Plymouth town ! 
Ask of the waves dandling in azure arms 
The guilty prows that speed across the seas, 
Bearing our brothers, squaws, and pappooses 
To hopeless bondagfe in the red-skyed south 
Where life is bound in caves of bitterness ! 
Nushkah ! mercy shown to such as these is crime 
To thee and thine, and mocks the austere time. 

Enter Tuspaquin. 

Philip. What news comes on thy haste ? 

Tuspaquin. The Plymouth father sends 

A flag of truce, and offers to exchange 
Ten red men for the life of Captain Church. 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 89 

This failing, they will make our brothers' breast 
A grave for lead, and sell the captured squaws 
Slaves in that land where sleeps the winter sun. 
Besides, he has called out all that remain 
Of young and old to gird their armor on ; 
Recruits from Shawmut begs, and all the towns 
Spared by the fire, with frenzied hands to roll 
Back our great wave ; the while on bended knees 
He prays the bullet into Philip's heart. 

Philip. The white flag back, and let me see 

Nothing but red ! I from this moment tear 
All softness from my nature, and will be 
Hard as the granite, hungry as the sea. 

Annawan. Have I not said ! 

Philip. Enough ! He shall not,live another day 
Lest deeper wrongs our weak forbearance pay. 
What ho ! the prisoner ! 

Church is led in. 

Now bind him, braves. 

\He is bound to the stake. 
Totatomet. Use no weak thongs ! 

Agamaug. His looks are downcast, and his mind 
is dyed 
Pensive, to color of his poor condition. 

Alderman. This is the test 

That writes his name on pages of the air, 
Or carves it on tradition's stone. 

Tatoson. Listen ! 

He prays in low voice to his nation's god 
Whose arm can aid him nevermore. 

Church. Alack the day ! How ill my sternness 
weighed 



90 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

The body's power to stand against that sleet 
Of torture, bruising and beating down to shame 
The tendrils of the will : the gauntlet run 
Down that black avenue with wild-eyed beasts 
Lined, whose clubs like fire-stones pelted my back, 
Till fortitude stooped to the foot of anguish ! 
Oh God ! thy grace supplant my feeble will 
Bound captive to the chariot of pain ; 
And like a rock beat back the grievous surge 
That saps this fort, for worse assault must come ! 
Thou light and refuge in the night of life. 
Send from the heaven of heavens where thou 

dost sit 
Enthroned in pity with the cherubim, 
A portion of .the deep spiritual power 
That pulses through the universe, and sways 
Unmitigate the hearts of favored men ; 
So in this tempest I may bear me well, 
And pass a stranger in the house of fear. 
Be not my sins remembered to my cost ; 
But think that I have trod the thorny path. 
The precipice of duty with a zeal. 
Not measured by thy purpose infinite. 
But such as 'neath the purest sun of faith 
Could grow in passion's field. 

Enter Wenonah. 

A little more, 
I must stand in the solemn court of death, 
And all mine acts by thine impartial eye 
Be judged. If I have plainly dealt with men ; 
If I thy sleeve of patience have not frayed 
And ravelled out by violence and sin. 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. gi 

Let thy strong arm support me in this stress ; 
Let thy good cheer be with me to the end. 

Totatojnet. A truce to this delay ! 

Pile on the fagots : let the dance begin ! 

Wenonah. False Seconet ! commend thy furiate 
soul 
To the pure patience ! — Braves, rest ye awhile ! — 
Pometacom, wake from this demon dream, 
And snatch thy mercy from the gulf of blood 
Where it is drowned. If ever I have done 
Service to thee, give order to thy braves 
To cut the withes that do the pale-face bind, 
And set him free. 

Philip. Thou ravest, Squaw. — 

Take her away ! 

Annazvan. Come ! come ! 

In realm of old Pokanoket 
We do not know command. 

Wenonah. Unhand me. Chief ! 

And in this mood cross not my path. 

Annawan. Nay, here thou must weed out 
That vice of temper, and obey. 

Wenonah. Thou gray iniquity ! it is thy hand 
That leads his purpose to this horror's verge. — 
Sachem, a Seconet appeals to thee, 
Head of a tribe that ever smoked with thine 
The calumet of peace. 

Philip. Didst thou not in thy lodge 

Sit still, and send my braves away ? 

Wenonah. Pometacom, 

It tortures me to see that stony look 
Where no hope dwells. 



92 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

Totatomet. Beware, Sachem, she hath a tongue 
Crooked as the prone snake's. 

Wenonah. Wrap him not up 

Within thy favor's cloak, for he hath sworn 
Against my life. Sachem, lend me thine ear : 
If I have ever harbored in my mind 
Friendship or fear for aught in Plymouth sails, 
I scuttle it in waters of my hate. 
Five hundred braves whose ears the music drink 
. Of ocean's waves that foam on Sogkonate, 
Shall hear with thee a sterner music breathe. 
A coat of wampum will I weave for thee, 
Whose price shall buy an hundred stand of arms ; 
And I will pray the perfect one above 
To hold thee in his hand, and victory drop 
Forever on thy path. 

Philip. When I have set my foot 

On all mine enemies, she offers this ! — 
Will ye not light the fire ? 

Wenonah. Hold ye ! — Take all I have. 

And grant me only this. Pometacom, 
I turn me from thy soul in fury mired. 
And pawing vainly up the bank of truth. 
Unto thy nobler self in reason's chair 
Seated, and made the guest of mercy. Chief, 
Thy heart hath known the painful joy of love ; 
, Counted hast thou the minutes to the time 

When thy fond eyes should mirror back the light 
Which in ethereal beauty seemed a part 
Of that pure sky that hangs above our heads : 
Each minute. shackled with the chain and ball 
Of hours ; each hour slow pacing to his end 
As if he bore upon his back a day. 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 93 

Call Up the ghosts of those dejiarted days ; 

Call from the grave of time those dear delights ; 

And they shall plead for me with thunder tongues ; 

And in the race unto thy favor's goal, 

Outstrip my words unwinged by eloquence, 

As nimble deer outstrip the slow-paced bear. 

Turn not thy face away ! Here bends a knee 

Which never yet the lowly earth hath kissed 

In supplication ; but sachems to it 

Have bowed, and deemed their dignity increased : 

Here do I kneel, and with my suitor breath 

Laden with rich devotion to thy cause, 

His freedom buy. 

Philip. Arise ! I wonder thou shouldst plant 
thy love 
Within a soul that hates thy native race. 

Weno7mk. Let him who never owned the house 
of flame 
Where dwells the human heart, my action blame. 

Philip. I am resolved. 

Wenonah. Nay, Sachem, here I stay till thou 
dost turn 
Thy passion out of doors, and, graces peep, 
Like cherubs, from thine eyes. 

Philip. Plead not for him ! 

His life stood in his clutch if he renounce 
The service of the English arms, and line 
His fortune's cloak with honors of our race : 
He trod upon the bosom of this chance, 
As who should say, freedom and ampler breath 
Grew nobler in the sunless fields of death. 

Wenonah. Give to my love 

What he denies to pride. 



94 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

Philip. No ! 

I am not one whose perfect plans are pushed 
And jostled from their path by woman's whim ; 
Nor would I bind an honor on my brow 
But what is harvested in fields of war : 
I shall not change. 

Wenonah, Is every feeling- of thy breast 

Mortgaged to hardness ? Power, I deem, should 

dwell 
In lodge of clemency, no hand stretch forth 
To nature's tyranny. Plucked is thy fame 
From tree of terror ; it will shrivel up 
And moulder on thy tomb : but let thy thoughts 
Soar to the heaven of mercy, thou art indeed 
The first man of the age. 

Philip. Wenonah, I have said. 

There is no inch of softness in my breast 
For mercy's roots to grow : my warriors slain, 
Their squaws and children banished in the sea, 
Would rise with shadowy hands and cut it down. 
Pity is fled from earth, and in the clouds 
Maketh her home with spirits of the dead. 

Wenonah. Where am I ? Are those stars whose 
tranquil eyes 
Should pity me, not mock my great despair ? 
Are those the beings of my flesh and blood 
Who should thrust in between my woe and thee, 
A guard of love ? Like figures carved in rock 
They stand, with lightnings wreathed around their 

brow. 
Ye worse than wolves that not devour their own ! 
Had I the braves I vainly offered thee, 
I had commanded, and ye would obey. 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 95 

Pometacom, thou art dressed in fierce blood — 
Blood spouting from thine eyes, thine ears and 

mouth, 
And in hot currents flowing to the ground, 
And leaping up in columns to thy head, 
And surging like a sea in dull eclipse. 
Till thou art all one crimson wave. Away ! • 
To liberty my hand will carve thy way. 

\Pashes through the crozvd to the stake, and cuts the 
thongs which bind the prisoner.^ 

Totatomet. The witch 

Loosens his bands — he's free ! 

Wenonah, Take thou this knife — I have another 
here. 
Flee ! I will follow. 

Church. Make way ! A death or two hangs in 
this blade. 
I have new strength, and he who bars my way 
Petitions death. Wenonah, leave me now. 

Wenonah. Nay, I will go. 
Be quick, or they surround thee. 

Totatomet. Thy fortune at the stake 

Laughs, but — [Hurls his tomahazvk, 

Philip. A nerveless arm ! 

Ho ! seize him, braves ! 

Church. For love of me, Wenonah, leave the 
fray. 
Philip must pardon thee. If I escape — 

[Warw hoops resound on all sides ^ and the Indians rush 
to seize Church, who strikes down several and turns 
to flee. \ 



g6 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

Totatomet. What ! doth he go ? 

Furies that ride the scorching blasts of hell 
Fondle this hand ! \Stabs Wenonah. 

Wenonah. Thou spotted heart ! The ashes of 
remorse 
Strangle thy prayers ! — Fly, Church, and live ! 

Church. I curse me that I live till now. 

Lighter than air, )'et heavier far than fate, 
Rest on my heart, and in its chamber dark 
Thy perfect soul shall sit and rule my thoughts 
Till death befriends me too. I cannot go. 
And see thee nevermore. — Who follows, dies ! 

\Takes up Wenonah in his arms, and disappears in 
the for est. \ 

Annawan. Foiled by a squaw ! 

Philip. Let five or six the fleetest braves pursue, 
And bring him back, alive or dead. — 

\Exeunt several braves. 
The Ruler pardon thee, Totatomet ; 
For thou hast broke her beauteous vase of life, 
And shook the perfume of its mortal flower 
Rudely in air. I loved thee as a son ; 
But henceforth be no warrior of mine. 

Totatomet. Sachem, 

I have shook hands with desperation ; so 
I bow me to thy will, and from thy tree 
Bark my dear hopes, how dear I cannot tell. 
But first I exile from my use this knife 
Which hath trod in her side, as cursed thing ; 
For it would scorch my hand and burn withal 
The marrow of my bones, in thought of her: 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 97 

But ye the precious drops that stain its lips, 
I will entreasure. 

[Dries the knife on his breast, and throws it down. 
I pray thee, thine : something I have to do. 

\To Agamaug. 
Farewell, Pometacom ! Her did I love ; 
But love's sweet dew in fang of jealousy 
Sucked and distilled, to poisonous frenzy turns. 
The pale-face lives ; and for his trail and mine 
Too narrow is the earth. \Exit, 

Philip. On the air their voices die ! 

Ere the night wind unbinds that lace of cloud 
From the moon's neck, they will be back; and then 
No accident can set denial's foot 
On thy great hope. 

Annawan. I am not sure : with hosts of fiends 
He is in league. Hearing he is at large 
Will sadden me. Ho ! double the pursuit ! 
A belt of wampum in my wigwam hangs 
For him who brings his scalp. 

[Exeunt several braves, 

Philip. I clothed me in a robe 

With all our battles painted in bright hues, 
And there his burning death. If he surprise 
Freedom, my fortune now at fullest orb 
Begins to wane. [Exeunt, 



98 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

SCENE III. — The Forest in Pokanoket. An Indian 
trail crossing a deep glen which opens on the sea. 
Night : as the scene progresses the day dawns. 

Enter Church bearing y^Y^tiOT^ An. 

Church. This point of woods laying an ebon 
hand 
Slim on the white cheek of the sovereign sea, 
Should be the south coast of Pokanoket. 
No further can I go ; my walls of strength 
Surrender to exhaustion. If no aid 
Come with the dawn, that light rebukes and ends 
These saucy woes, to me the truest aid. 
My precious burden here will I lay down 
On this green bed spread by the gracious sun. 
Dead ! dead ! Fair casket of the richest soul 
Ever was current in this sordid world, 
With its pure coin to buy my worthless life. 
But see ! with stealthy pace the blood creeps back 
In her cold cheek, hoisting his standard there 
To rally hope. 

Wcno7iah. Ah me ! 

Church. Wenonah ! 

Wenonah. Are we still pursued ? 

Church. The darkness puts to sleep 

Their drowsy chase. 

Wenonah. Blood has been shed, 

And thou art wounded too. 

Church. Had some knife 

Gifted my body with a mortal blow, 
I now were happy. 

Wenonah. Thou shouldst have left 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 99 

Me to my fate, and put thine own true life 
Beyond their reach. How are we here ? 

Church. It will distress thee more : 

Think not of it. 

Wenonah. Nay, the story I will take. 
Token of thee, to that home the west wind 
Is winging me, and treasure it for aye. 

Church. Two I had slain ; one held the trail 

Outstripping his dull comrades in the race. 
And chid my yawning speed till further flight 
No glimpse of safety saw. I turned me round : 
With swifter spring leaps not the incensed bear 
When in a bone-strewn cave, lit by her eyes, 
A hunter seeks her cubs, than at his throat 
I flew, his yell entombing ere its birth ; 
And feasted in his blood my hungry knife. 
The end is not yet : another must drain 
That fatal chalice, hostage still for thee. 

Wenonah. I die content. 

Look on me so ! Within thy glance I see 
A speechless tongue that doth translate thy love 
In language of devotion that knows not 
The dialect of change. This timeless end 
Trips up the retinue of golden days 
My fancy started when our lives as one 
Should drift to God on waves of happiness ; 
And when thy hand should loose my virgin zone, 
And me make mother of some old-time race 
To plant an iron age. The sword of fate 
Thrust from the ambush of a friendly hand, 
Remorseless falls, and mutilates my hope : 
But how I love thee ! 
Church, This is more cruel loss 



lOO PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

To plough and harrow o'er my brow of life, 
Than all the fiery dangers I have passed. 
Had I been tutored in the stoic creed, 
I'd throw away the gift of longer days 
To follow thee — friends, honor, and the fame 
That lackeys deeds of praise, all, all that earth 
Holds dear, and view them motes in thy great beam 
Of rapture-giving thoughts. A radiant one. 
Hallowed and perfect, will I hold thee here, 
Till time in pity cuts my mortal thread. 

Wenonah. Come nearer. Church ! I wish to feel 
thine arm 
Around me — there is stealing over me 
An icy breath — and cold invades my limbs — 
And feelings strange do harbor in my heart. 
A calmness as of sleep creeps to my brain. 
And rings my senses in a sisterhood 
Of dreams. Like lappings of the ocean's tongue 
On face of a pebbled strand, the sounds of earth 
Are smothered in mine ear. Remember me — 
And think I only loved my life for thee. \Dies, 

Enter Totatomet. 

Church. Farewell, forever fare thee well ! 

Now heaven lead me half the height she scaled. 
And I am worthy ! — Ha ! thou damned wretch ! 
My tongue it blisters to articulate 
Thy hell-born name. 

Totatomet. Thou canst not loathe it more than I. 

Church. What wouldst thou here, 

Thou mailed in guiltiness ? Hast come to gloat 
Over my misery, and to steep thy hate 
Up to its very top in horror's gulf ? 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. lOI 

Behold the tragic burden of this earth ! 

Look where thy knife staggered in her[dear side, 

And churlishly thrust to the vulgar air 

The fairest soul that in a house of clay 

Did ever dwell. Thee shall damnation seize, 

And drag thee down the howling coast of hell. 

Where fiends shall fly with thee in burning winds, 

Or swim through lakes of sulphur, and all time 

Griddle thy flesh on endless coals of fire, 

As I could now. 

Totatomet. Thy passion shall not wring 
Out of my cold despair a single word. 
Stand thou aside awhile ; for I would plant 
In my sad mind the tokens of a face 
Whose beauty I did worship. It is our trait 
The red man never weeps ; else could mine eyes 
Pour drops as fast as bearded spruce their gum 
On the black ground, when spring unchains'its life ; 
Washing in love those pure and livid lines, 
Till tears had thawed the icy hand of death. — 
Strew ashes on your heads, ye Seconets ! 
And wail in shrillest voice ; for she is dead 
Whose sway poured honor on our Sogkonate. 
This hand was traitor to my purposes. 
That should in loyal service of thy life 
Grow lean and wrinkled, rather than betray. 
I had not thought in this to play the squaw ; 
Nor deemed that in the valleys of my heart 
The flowers of pity grew. If curses come, 
My soul will bow and bid them welcome : meet 
It is that I should suffer. Fare thee well !— 
Pale-face, what wouldst thou have ! 

Church, Naught but thy life. 



I02 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

Totatoinet. A foeman dost thou see not greatly 
cares 
If victory shall on his banner perch. 
I stand within the ruins of my life : 
Ever the same to me is peace or strife. 
The Seconet is ready. 

Church. Then to it. 

\They fight with knives : Totatomet /^^x/Zy.] 

Totatoinet. Pale-face, 

I thank thee, though thy hand did strike in hate. 
With us it is a crime to slay the chief 
Who in our tribal lodges bears a sway : 
An exile he must be, and every hand 
Devoted to his death. Me hast thou freed 
By strumpet chance ensnared, and in the air 
Of nobler fortunes set. [Dies, 

Church. I am undone ; this triumph costs me 
dear : 
It cannot balm my deep and gaping wounds. 
Thy life for hers thrown in the scale of fate 
Is light as down ; and mine is desolate, 
Hope-barren as the deeds this night hath seen. 
The burning lips of fever suck my wounds ; 
Upon my shoulders hangs a robe of fire : 
This dell is like to be a triple grave. 
Come, dissolution, with thy fingers cold 
And close my door of sense ; and all the lights 
Of hope and pride that in this mansion burn 
Snuff out : let valor die that had no power 
To snatch her from the frosty kiss of death ; 
Be hatred rampant on this earthly stage, 
And slaughter raging here with crimson jaws 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. IO3 

Dig ancient chaos from the grave of time ; 

Eclipse tear from the forehead of the sky 

The golden tresses of the hateful sun ; 

And the vast night preach in his pulpit black 

The sermon of the dead. [Falls in a swoon. 

Enter Samponcut. 

Samponciit. By Segwun's tears ! 

I little thought to find me here — ah me ! 
But who can stand the siege of scolding wife ? 
All day she did bombard my ears with cries 
And wailings for her " Squaw," her " motherling," 
Her ''sweet Wenonah," till my temples throbbed 
Like pines in the fierce blasts of winter's wind. 
My meat was sauced with her reproaches loud ; 
The glass of my sweet sleep was cracked by them. 
What could I do ? I like an easy time 
Loafing around the village, and to snooze 
Under an oak the long, long summer day ; 
Or to lie fishing on a grassy bank 
As moveless as a turbid rattlesnake 
Clutched by the frost down in his stony den. 
But, by the hoary beard of Peboan ! 
My peace was taken captive by her tongue ; 
And nothing could it ransom back again 
But I should go and find the Sachemess, 
And bring her home. 
I bade adieu to all my ancient haunts ; 
And stored my bark with clams and venison, 
In loyal homage to my belly's lord ; 
For many plans are marred that to this god 
Neglect to sacrifice : and as the sun 
Stood tip-toe on the blue Pocasset hills, 



I04 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

I girded up my loins, and wended on. 

Ugh ! If I be not shot in wanton blood 

By some of those young bucks from Plymouth 

town, 
And scalped alive, a seventh son am I, 
And snap my lucky fingers at mischance. 
But now the infant day in cloudy locks 
Is peering out the windows of the east, 
And I must spur my jaded valor on. 
But soft ! What have we here ? A sleeping brave ? 
Rouse, sluggard, rouse ! Too precious are these 

hours 
To gird the waist of slumber ! Art thou drunk ? 
As I do live it is Totatomet. 
What ho ! Totatomet ! No moving yet ! 
He's soaked in blood, and hears no earthly call. 
Ha ! what is this beyond ? A ghastly crop 
This dingle bears. A squaw ! Our Seconet ! 
Oh death ! thou harvestest the ripe and the unripe ; 
And crammest full thy barns with human grain, 
To glut thy winter maw ! Who groaneth there ? 
Is one alive ? 

Church. Help ! 

Samponcut. Hist ! 

Church. Help ! if thou hast a heart 

That beats for human woe. 

Samponcut. I know that voice. 

Church. Thou art a Seconet, and hadst the part 
Of service in her life who lies in coldness. 
Bind up my wounds that fester in the air ; 
And have my thanks and the report of deeds 
To slake thy wonder's thirst. 

Samponcut. I will do so ; 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. IO5 

And pray thy hand is free of such black guilt 

In tearing down and robbing of its light 

That beauteous house. So, so : now canst thou 

stand ? 
I'll lead thee to my boat in yonder cove : 
And then return to ship this dismal freight, 
And steer us home. 

Church. [Kneels at Wenonah's side.] 

Let me but coffin in mine arms 
This dear mortality. The birds awake, 
And cradle in the air their happy songs ; 
But we shall never hear thy voice again. 
Thy beauty is bequeathed to miser death 
Whose halls are crowded with the lovely ones 
Of this sad earth, and still unsatisfied 
Drafts us for more. — 

Bear with me, Seconet ; 
For this subdues my fortitude. No more ! 
Lead on ! I've felt my sorrows as a man : 
Now bend my looks the future's brow to scan. 

\Sce7ie closes. 
7 



ACT V. 

SCENE I.— Plymouth. The shore of the Bay, with 
Plymouth Rock : the ground covered with snow. 

Enter a Citizen. 

Citizen. In Thy sight a thousand years 
Are but as yesterday, and as a watch 
Upon the hills of night. How even now 
Thine anger doth consume us, and Thy wrath 
Makes us afraid. 

Enter Second Citizen. 

Hast heard the rumor, Job ? 

Second Citizen. Now, by my faith ! 

Mine ears are stuffed with rumors, as an inn 
On stormy night with lated travellers. 

Eirst Citizen. But this one smacks of truth, and 
it will slap 
The face of thy composure. It is said 
The army is defeated and dispersed — 
That goodly force bearing in its strong hand 
Our best, last hope. Alack ! we are undone. 

Second Citizen. Fie on that garrulous dame ! 

Truth hang her up in chains, and then cut out 
Her thousand tongues. Ben Church our muster 

leads ; 
And when he steers the vessel of the war, 
I sleep in peace. 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. I07 

First Citizen. I fear me for that noble band 
Whose steps are meshed in snows, while icy winds 
Fold them in death. So long hath victory's arms 
Fondled the name of Philip, we but live 
In suburbs of her love. 

Second Citizen. Nay, Humble Ames, 

Quell thy despair and pin thy faith to Church. 
He studied in the school of Indian arts : 
Each trick of ambush, manner of attack 
He is familiar with. If any one 
Can coax a smile from lips of stern mischance, 
Church is the man. — 

Enter a Messenger. 

Golightly, art thou from the camp ? 

Messenger. Ay, Master Job. 

Second Citizen. Well, what's the word ? 

Messenger. Too feeble is my breath 

To lift the news to hearing. 

First Citizen. 'Tis heavy then ? 

I never knew a one who bore good news 
But blurts it out. 

Messenger. Ha ! ha ! ha ! If my speed had not 
The last two hours devoured a dozen miles, 
I would be merry. 

First Citizen. I would thy legs might teach thy 
tongue 
Some better speed. 

Second Citizen. Come ! come ! tell us the worst. 

Messenger. Ye drooping hearts ! from garden of 
your mind 
Weed out that thought. If hundreds of the red 
Devils with bloody arms their bride of death 



loB PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

Clasping-, charred in the flames that wrapped their 
fort 

In robes of ruin, seem to you a loss, 

What, then, is victory ? 

First Citizen. How now ! what dost thou say ? 
Second Citizen. Ho ! give him time, and he will 
weave 

A glorious tale. 
Messenger. Rather put in my clutch 

That dark green bottle, and my tongue will run 

Fast as thy wish. 
Second Citizen, Odds boddikins ! my manners 
slept. \Gives him a flask. 

Messenger. Silence itself will this make elo- 
quent. \Drinks, 

Know, then, our arms have kissed the mouth of 
triumph ; 

And in the Narraganset swamp have backward 
rolled 

The tide of Indian conquest. 'Twas a day 

That did make faces at our bodily ease ; 

In which the elements struggled with man 

For first degree and prize of cruelty. 

With swords of snow and sleet the surly air 

Guarded the pathway to the hostile town : 

So little day could elbow through the storm 

We deemed that jealous night usurped his throne. 

Besides high palisades, hedges of trees 

A rod in thickness, felled around the fort, 

Our valor mocked and dressed our hopes in black. 

No way was there to enter but a log 

Spanning the moat, which passage did forbid 

To more than one. 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. IO9 

With courag-e that in golden letters writ 
Should be bound in the deathless book of fame, 
Our faithful soldiers trod that faithless path 
Where death's vast tongue did lick them up by 

scores. 
In deadly silence was their place„ supplied ; 
And still those borrowed lives were ravined down 
The throats of flame. And all indeed was lost, 
But that a desperate band by Mosely led, 
Taught to unhoard their blood at freedom's call. 
And shrug at death the shoulder of contempt, 
Had got them in the rearward of the fort. 
These, hand to hand, contended with the braves 
At fearful odds, until the cry *' They run," 
Larded their ribs of fright with such fresh force, 
It struck a panic in the Indian host. 
Then was the hand of terror wide unclasped ; 
And slaughter like a fiend broken from hell 
Did stride amid their ranks. From lodge to lodge 
In anguish flying, pappooses, squaws, and braves 
Our swords pursued, and supped them in their 

blood. 
In heaps on heaps, a weltering mass they lay. 
The ruby currents of their ebbing hearts 
The banks of snow dissolving. Give me grace. 
If our revenge did shock the marble face 
Of heaven ; for in our breasts did Ate dwell. 
And, shrieking, gentle mercy bade farewell. 
Now yield me food and rest. 

Second Citizen. Thou shalt have all. 

The wonder and contentment in my breast 
So strive, my tongue is conscript to the war. 
And looks must do his office. This will be 



no PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

To Winslow's mind the shadow of a great rock 

Within a weary land. Pray he return ! 

Go thou, good Humble, and apprise the town 

With chimes and ringing of the merry bells 

In the embattled church, 

That fortune ,^ow to us is penitent, 

And hath no thought but to our vantage bent. 

First Citizen. I will ; and soon your company 
will join 
To hear Golightly once again recoin 
His wondrous tale. 

Second Citizen. Do so, and be 
Welcome. — Come, Malachi ! ^ [Exeunt. 



SCENE II. The Forest in Pocasset. An Indian 
form flits between the trees, followed presently by 
others, in twos and threes. Then solitude, broken 
only by the tap of a woodpecker on the trunk of 
a white pine. 

Agamaug, ensconced in a clump of scrub oak, 
glides like a snake over the scene, and peers down 
the aisles of trees. Satisfied, apparently, there are 
no foes, he rises to his feet, and utters a guttural 
" Onaway." The screen of columbine which covers 
the mouth of a cave in the rocks is parted, and 
Alderman with noiseless tread stands at his 
brother's side. 

Agamaug. Their footsteps wander from the 
trail, 
And danger us no more. Our greatest foe 
Sits at our council fire. 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET, III 

Alderman. Come, Agamaug, no more of that. 

Againaug. The mama studs the trunk of yonder 
pine 
With wormy acorns, so its famine dies 
When snow the ground besieges. Shall we less ? 

Alderman. The pelican will dip her bill 

In her own heart, to feed her fainting young. 
Into the chasm of our nation's need 
Should we not throw our lives ? 

Agamaug. But ansv\rer me: 

Are our free souls in bondage to his will, 
And may not drink the air of their resolves ? 

Alderjnan. Let never echo chase those words 
again, 
For they do blur thy gloss of loyalty ; 
And in their action and report will pull 
Misfortune on thy life. Brother, be calm ! 

Agamazig. Is the sea calm when the rough winds 
Tear out its crystal hair, and dash it down 
On the grim rocks ? Nay, teach Pometacom 
A gentle way. 

Alderman. Will the pine stoop 

Its shoulder to the brake, the eagle nest 
Beside the wren ? 

Agamaug. We should not to his desperate pur- 
pose dye 
Our own clear minds ; nor dip his mad designs 
In fountain of our praise. The Chiefs are in revolt, 
And grasp this sad occasion by the hand 
To save the remnant of their broken tribes. 
In mournful tones the Swamp defeat doth tell 
Pokanoket to freedom bids farewell. 

Aldermati. It may be so, but in his fame I have 



112 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

A lover's privilege, and now I am 
Alone with him. 

Agamaug. How ! What says he ? 

Alderman. When my will was law, 

The torch of victory was passed along 
From hand to hand of battle, till it grew 
One canopy of fire that dropped on earth 
Embers of massacre whose hundred throats 
Sucked up the English power. 

Agamaug. His opportunity, 

Not seized at proper time, is ever gone. 
A thousand hearts whose golden blood did pass 
In deeds of terror o'er the shrieking land, 
Lie shrouded in the clotted slime and ooze 
That creeps in silence round that fatal fort : 
No voice may call them from the mortal sleep 
In which ambition's hand hath buried them. 
And is his genius so omnipotent 
That it can clothe the beings of his brain 
With flesh and blood, to rush into the gap 
Mown by his pride, and to the whites present 
An undejected brow ? 

A Idermaji. Call it no fault of his if treason's hand 
Unlatched our hope in Narraganset Swamp. 
Already hath he bandaged up that loss 
On field of Lancaster ; and to the whites 
Marching in Medfield held 
The goblet of defeat. 

The Sachem's fortune, one foot in the grave. 
Pulls not his courage after. He desponds 
Never, nor bends the head of confidence 
To knee of doubt ; for doubts are foxes' breed, 
And do betray us in the hour of need. I 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. II3 

Aga7Jtaug. Wall ! 

With flattery his deeds are fenced around ; 
And there be none with soul enough to dare 
Let down the bars of censure. 

Alderman. Agamaug, 

For that he woke the giant of this strife 
In noble cause, his race will cherish him ; 
And any word that purpose doth deny 
Grows in the swamp of malice. Let us die, 
And fill one common grave, than now draw back, 
And stoop to lick that wronging hand. 

Agamaiig. Nay, rather let us live, 

And work our mission out. A timely peace 
Which we may mould in likeness of our wish. 
With arms in hand ; a portion of our lands ; 
The lives we bear and those we hold in love ; 
And silent memories of heroic deeds, 
May purchase now. I go to the dread Chief, 
Bearing this bitter draught ; and I will sing 
Even unto his face the tragic note 
That in my ear is ringing. 

Alderman. Alas ! thou knowest not Pometacom 
If thou dost think his soul will kneel to peace 
While loyalty can marshal to the fray 
A single spirit of Pokanoket ; 
While his right arm the listening air can charm 
With music of the whizzing tomahawk. 
I love thee, Agamaug, and would not see 
Thy life stand in the lightning of his wrath. 
Agamaug. His sway is but the child of our 
desires, 
And not their master. Fare thee well ! 



114 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

Alderman. Unhappy man ! I fear me for the 
worst 
While this resentment spurs thy foaming thoughts 
To brink of danger. I will go with thee. 

\Exeunt. 

SCENE III. Metapoiset. The Indian camp on the 
banks of the Taunton. 

Enter Philip and Tatoson. 

Tatoson. By the skin 

Of the fierce rattlesnake twined in my hair, 
The totem which I worship, it is true : 
Their loose allegiance have the Pecomptucks 
Thrown off, and scattered to their river towns. 

Philip. False as water, fickle as the wind ! 

They were the last to dig the hatchet up. 
The first to bury it. Time-servers' minds 
The cord of faith and honor never binds. — 

Enter Annawan. 
What mutiny now walks abroad ? 

Annawan. Pometacom, 

Throw not on me that eye of basilisk 
That kills with looking. 

Philip. Be content : 

I hurt them not I love. 

Annawan. Hear, then ! The Nipmuck chief, 
Clasping the hand of rude rebellion, hath 
Called all his braves from the projected fray. 
And sullenly files back his homeward way. 

Philip. Thou art a man so perfect and complete, 
It ill becomes thy parts to father lies. 



» 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. II5 

Let tongues that never warned, though they 

should be 
Organs of nature or the sky's rapt tones, 
Knock at my door of hearing with those words, 
I should but cram them down their joyless throats, 
Saying they lie. 

Annawan. My Chief, 'tis even so ; 
And that it's so, I grieve me I had eyes 
To draw the image of that basest act 
Upon my sense recoiling. 

Philip. Traitors ! 

If there be any word of deeper shame 
To soak their memory in and rot their name, 
I want it now. 

Annawan. There is more ; 
But none have dared to bring the news to thee. 
And I will strangle the misshapen birth 
Even in bed of utterance. 

Philip. Nay, go on : 

I am a rock where fiercest surge of grief 
May beat in vain. 

Annawan. Dear Sachem, 

nfected by the virus of revolt, 
Deeming the issue travels to despair. 
The Narragansets have drawn off their bands 
And fasten on the moccasin of peace. 

Philip. I pray you, look. 

And tell me if I seem a common man 
Whose eye hath lost its sway. If I am less. 
This fadeless cause should dilate in their thought 
To mountain size, and dwarf all earthly things. 
Oh reputation ! art thou but a cloak 
That one may turn or cast away at will. 



Il6 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

Even as suits his whim, and buy from time 

Trappings of approbation that will blind 

The eyes of men to rottenness within ! 

My fortunes are corrupted by the blood 

That should ennourish them. Why do I chide ? 

Let treason come ! I did not beckon it ; 

I held me clear. If they with most foul hands 

Deflower our mission's virgin purity, 

I have respected it and held it dear. — 

Enter Tuspaquin. 

Now, Assawomset, choke these venom throats, 
Or play a cheerful strain. 

Tuspaquin, Pometacom, my Chief, 

In cabin of thy fortune I have lodged ; 
And I will be a neighbor to thy loss. 

Philip. If we have read our wampum right, 

Thine is a race steadfast to its resolves. 
It medicines the sickness of my state 
To look on thee : I know that thou hast played 
Well thy last part. 

Tuspaquin. Sachem, some other tongue must be 
The deputy of what I bear. 

Philip. Ha ! what is it ? Speak out ! 

I am so deep in sorrow's bitter sea 
Nothing can push me further. 

Tuspaquin. Good my Chief, 

What they have told thee of desertions base, 
Of that rebellious tide upon thy shore 
Creeping with inky feet, and battles lost, 
Are but the prologue to this greater scene 
Writ out by pen of shame. 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. II7 

Philip. Well ! 

Thou seest me how I stand. 

Tuspaquin. At Acushnet 

With all the Assawomset braves I lay, 
Guarding thy squaw and child confided us 
In hope we might grope through the cloud of 

whites, 
And in the bleak north an asylum find 
Kinder than men. The fingers of the dawn 
Had just unlaced the purple robe of night, 
When led by Church a hundred Plymouth men. 
Like lightning swords flashing from vapor sheaths, 
Fell on us sleeping. Musket voices belched 
Their leaden missives folded up in flame, 
That argued down the whooping of my braves. 
Our angry guns answered the challenge stern. 
Giving to death a legacy of foes. 
With mine own arm three did I cleave to earth. 
But two to one they overmatched our strength ; 
And valor made a flatterer of retreat. 
We fled : I sought Oneka and thy son ; 
But in the surge of battle they were borne 
On rocks of bondage. Sachem, I am unfit 
Longer to breathe the beneficial air : 
Take thou this blade and sheathe it in my breast. 

Kneels before Philip, bares his bosom, and offers him his 
knife ^ 

Philip, A many perils have I passed, but this 
Staggers my mind. Is it so, Annawan ? 
I look upon the ground, and yet it yawns 
No bottomless mouth to draw me in. The heavens 
That once were fair and noble to my sight. 



Il8 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

Now seem more terrible than serpents' eyes 
When they strike them in men's to fascinate. 
I had a heart within whose gates did pass 
A regiment of tender sentiments ; 
But it hath grown to marble in this hour. 

Annawan. Thy words have drifted on his heart 
A bitter snow. Better, away. 

Tuspaquin. I'll find a ditch, 

And there my body lay. \Exit. 

Philip. Where hath he gone ? 

Bear with me, braves, if I a gentle thought 
Bequeath to those perfections. It is past ; 
And now I turn me from that black abyss 
Where all that smoothed the hardness of my life, 
And featured me, is clasped in arms of loss; 
And buckle on the belt of fortitude, 
This monster world defying. 

E?iter Agamaug aitd Alderman. 

What bold dismay 
Posts on your tongues ? Strike on ! I alter not 
If cataracts of woe burst on my head. 
So stony is it here. [Strikes his breast. 

Alderman. What cause hast thou ! 

Philip. Says any one that I 

Have not done well ? Or could my fortunes grow 
Forever, like that reptile of the south 
Mud-dwelling, when my instruments are men ? 

Agamaug. Pometacom, 

The Manitou is angry with his sons, 
And speaks his censure so. 

Annaivan. Now, if my friendship yet 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. II9 

Is honored of thy mind, go kill such words 
On thine own tongue. 

Philip. Great Medicine, wilt thou sew up 
This ragged time ? 

Agamaug. Listen, Pometacom, 

For in thy hand is held the doom of men. 
The time is deathly sick ; and to a grave 
Hobble our pallid fortunes. We have played 
The fatal game of war, and we have lost. 
The allies have deserted ; in our ranks 
Treason and pestilence walk hand in hand. 
And daily thin our sturdy ribs of war. 
Like withered leaves we shudder in the blast 
Of English power which, from the sea-bathed east. 
Rushes with gloomy hands to strip our tree. 
The flower of Pokanoket is in the earth ; 
And whispers in the dusty ear of death, 
" We fell in vain ! " The living be thy care ; 
And while we may with free and sovereign breath 
Parley with fate for honorable terms. 
Seize the occasion, and our country's wounds 
Close up and heal. 

Alder mart. Sachem, in the dim woods that nurse 
Strange forms of thought, visions have come to him ; 
But if his counsel sits in lodge of harshness, 
And grates upon thine ear, his purpose is 
Attorney to our weal. 

Philip, Have ye now done, 

Or do ye hold in leash to slip on me 
Fresh hounds of grief .? 

Agamaug. Sachem, 

I voice the feeling of the tribe. 

Philip, No! 



120 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

Agamaiig. Yes ! 

PJiilip. How ! all are recreant to their faith, 
And kiss the haggard cheek of this revolt ? 
If this were true, I would push off 
The mountain of my days, and the false tribe 
Captain with thee. But no ! 
Thou sowest in mine ear 
A slander. Now have done ! 

Alder rna7i. No more of this ! Come ! 

Agamaiig. \ Going. \ Whom the Great Spirit 
would destroy, 
He first of reason robs. 

Philip. Thou art a child : our safety lies 
But in the victor arm. 

Agamaug. [^Re turning.'] Must all be sacrificed 
To offer bloody incense to thy fame ? 
Loss piled on loss, defeat upon defeat, 
Till war's hand build him of the red men's bones 
A ghastly monument that shall outstare 
The blazing eye of heaven, to after-times 
Writing the folly of Pometacom. 

Annawan. The serpent sings ; the eagle flies : 
My maiden love is in the skies. 

Philip. Oh cold adversity ! teach me restraint ! 

Alderman. Thy judgment slumbers : come ! 

Agamaug. I never bound my free thought to 
control. — 
Sachem, this is a time to shut the door 
In face of flattery, and see ourselves, 
Even as we do live, in glass of truth. 
We dwelt beneath the genial sun of peace ; 
In numbers grew apace ; and wrapped us up 
In richest mantle of prosperity. 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 121 

We were content ; but still there crouched in thee 
An evil spirit envious of our lot, 
That fired thy soul to hottest lust of war, 
And lured it blindly to adulterate 
In gay ambition's bed. Oh, for a voice 
Whose deep echoes might live in ear of time ; 
And at the mention of thine ill-starred name, 
Start up and rave in solemn warning tones : 
*^ Thou wert thy country's curse, and dropped dis- 
ease 
Upon her healthy state, and gave thy will 
A free bridle to drive her to her ruin." 

Philip. Hang at thy throat 

The red fangs of the wolf, and strangle thee ! 
I sin against the freedom of my state 
In wording this with thee. But for I wish 
Thy passion should not smear the name I bear 
Purely before these dear and veteran braves. 
My vengeance should not lag behind mine ire, 
But bathe it in thy blood. What ! I ?— 
Ingrateful wretch, how many beads of favor 
Dost thou unstring — 

The blood I dropped on twenty glorious fields 
Should rise to life, and stifle in thy throat 
That giant lie. I gave the nation all ; 
And if fidelity may brag of one 
That loved her with unspotted soul, 'tis he 
Who stands within thy sleet of injury. 
Away ! and live ! or I shall lay on thee 
Hands that are terrible. 

Agamaug. I go, but not from fear. Be thou 
Still governed by thy dark and desperate will ; 
Quaff blood like water ; be thy stepping-stones 
8 



122 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

Skulls which shall pave this lost Pokanoket 
As stars the sky ; and set thee tip a court 
Only of the pale dead. 

PJiilip. Where thou shalt reig-n ! \Stabs him^ 

Alderman, Who striketh him, 
Doth make a foe of me. 

Annawan, Make way ! 

Put up thy hatchet — so ! {^Disarms Alderman, 

PJiilip. Braves, treason's tooth had gnawn away 
the thongs 
That bound his duty to Pokanoket ; 
And so I struck lest he betray us too, 
And face the garment of ingratitude 
With blackest infamy. 

Alderman. Pometacom, let that deep lie 
Blister thy tongue ! 

Philip. Ha ! 

Alderman. Stand back ! — 

How is it, Agamaug ? 

Agamaug. Thou must dwell in the evil days ; 
But I am free. With kind hands to my grave 
Bring me a gourd of water and fresh food, 
That so my soul be armored from the fiends 
On its last journey. It was the tribe's hope. 
Whatever he says, innocent I die : 
Prove it to men, thou witness in the sky ! \Dies, 

Alderman. Farewell, thou noble heart ! 
I thought thy way to herald in the grave. 
Not follow it. Peace to thy gentle shade ; 
And all good spirits guard thee to the land 
Happ)^ with light of never-ending day. — 
Pometacom, wrong hast thou done in this ; 
And wakened here a feeling that will slake 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. I23 

Its bitter thirst at fountain of thy heart. 

His face was dear to me ; his little steps 

I led when first a child he clung and played 

Around our father's lodge. I taught his arm 

To bend the ashen bow ; and his quick cries 

Of boyish joy when sped the mimic shaft, 

Was music in mine ear. His golden dawn 

Lighted the forehead of my manly prime : 

In thought I lived my youth again in him. 

He camped within my love ; he was the eye 

With which I saw the world, and thought it fair ; 

And as we ranged beneath the hoary trees, 

The gracious silence seemed to subtly weave 

In one firm thread the feelings of our hearts. 

In slaying him thou hast slain part of me : 

And poisoned at its source the loyalty 

I bore thy person and devoted cause. 

Revolt and deadly hate are now my liege ; 

And they do cut away and amputate 

My gangrened worship. In the tides of war 

That lap thy feet, mine arm will swim the first ; 

And rising on a cloud of vengeance up 

To spleen my sky of rage, at last shall fall 

A thunderbolt on thee. • [Exit. 

Philip. Through misery's wide thicket leads 
My way of life : forever must I live 
Vassal to fear, though ye, I think, are true. 
It was a golden mouth, and would have stirred 
Against our arms some quick and nimble wrong. 
He tempted fate, and on forbearance' back 
Put such a load, my justice threw it off. 
Give him such burial as befits a brave ; 
Then meet me in the gulch where lies a band 



124 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

Posted to intercept the whites. The scouts 

Must soon return with fresh intelligence. 

This ambush will reset our broken fight, 

And give the traitors pause. Away ! [Exeunt. 



SCENE IV. — PoKANOKET. The English camp on the 
edge of a swamp. Night : the camp-fires burning. 
Soldiers bivouacked under the trees. 

Enter Church and Golding. 

Gelding. He reports 

The remnant of the thinned Wampanoags 
Have mustered their despair in yonder swamp, 
To make a last appeal to victory. 

Church, It is but trial of their heels again, 
Or battle on our terms. 

Golding. They will run, 

For these defeats pour in their willing ears 
The sweetness of their former life of peace. 
Desertions are as frequent as the bright 
Visits the cheerful dawn pays to the east : 
The few that drop their sad-eyed, stone-cold hopes 
Into the ocean of fidelity, 
Quickly will seize the hand of any chance 
That leads to door of peace. 

Church. True, Philip's strong will alone 

Cements the wall of their resistance : he 
Taken or dead, their edifice of war 
Will crumble down. 

Golding. My Captain, this campaign 

Powders thy sky with honors, and thy name 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 1 25 



Brevets with ne plus ultra ; but the thought 
Roots not the sorrow from thy countenance 
Some loss hath planted there. Yet I have heard 
Men will in solemn moments of their lives, 
As this is now, a premonition feel 
Of death's sad coming, when they see beyond 
Horizons of the present to the day 
Presiding over our mortality. 

Church. Ah, Golding, 

There is no magic in the morrow's fray 
To spell my spirits into banishment. 
I go to it with such a willing mind 
As he may hold who seeks his bridal QQUch ^ 
Or any careless heart that casts its sail 
On fortune's waves, and sees in fancy ride 
A golden shore whose sands shall wash his hope^ 
With riches of Peru. But this difference mine : 
While they set in their view the happy end, 
As love, possessions, quest of noble deeds, 
I value them as nothing more than dross. 
And consecrate and crown the labor's brow 
But with the joy of doing. 

Golditig. Some poisoned shaft 

Hath drunk the fountain of thy genial ways. 
Where we have seen the figure of a wish 
To walk the world in plausive voice of men. 

Church. Ay, thou dost touch 

That frail desire with finger of the truth, 
Which now is but an echo in my life, 
The skeleton of all my sturdy hopes. 
How my ambition's stream out of its course 
Rudely was turned by fate's malignant hand. 
And creeps in dull bed of " I-do-not-care," 



126 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

Thy sympathy shall know. 

I wooed an Indian maiden ; and my love 

Was of so high and regal quality, 

It ordered from their place all meaner things 

That stand and cry " deliver," to the world. 

My passion found a kingdom in her soul 

Where every waking thought a courtier was 

That knelt in duty at my throne of love. 

Our vows were plighted, and we but delayed 

A holy sanction till this vase of war 

Was cracked to pieces by the hand of peace. 

In Hadley fight where Lothrop's regiment 

Sank in the mire of slaughter, with his life, 

I fell a captive to Totatomet, 

A brave of Sogkonate ; and by command 

Of Philip was I sentenced to the stake. 

The brush and fagots round my feet were piled ; 

The swarthy faces of the jeering braves 

Shot glances 'thwart the lurid pine-knot fires, 

That gave a foretaste of the horrid draught 

Distilled for me ; and plimged an icy hand 

Deep in my blood. 

Golding, It would have laid in fear 

An iron heart. 

CJiiLTcJi. I stood that moment on the edge of life. 
An hour's flight, and 'mid the warriors' yells. 
Ferried on burning wings of agony, 
My spirit must have sped in that black gulf 
That bounds these mortal shores. And fabling 

hope 
Which is our nurse of life, deserted me ; 
And I, a truant from the perfect faith, 
In mine extremity had put my thoughts 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. I27 

Grown tip in sin, to school of our great Master, 
That haply he promote me in his love 
To seat of grace, when my deliverance came. 
From out the sea of gloom — 

Enter Alderman. 

Alderman. Hail ! pale-face, 

And in thy wigwam peace ! 

Church. Who art thou ? 

Alderman. One that the wing of injury 

Wafts to thy side. 

Church. Wampanoag ? 

Alderman. Until to-day ; 

But while Pometacom folds him in flesh, 
A hater of the name. 

Church. What wouldst thou do ? 

Alderman, What ye have not yet done, though 
at your side 
Cohorts of soldiers stood, and terror ran 
Before your steps — I mean, if ye will not 
Shudder, trap the fox of Pokanoket. 

Church. How shall we know 

Thy words are clothed in true sincerity ? 

Alderman. Test me by any proof thou wilt. 
The unequalled genius of Pometacom 
Was honored in my mind ; I cut his wrongs 
In stone of my devotion. Where he led 
I followed, feeding the anger of my blood 
With ruin of the whites. Close at my side 
Fought Agamaug, my brother, in whose life 
I ever spread the blanket of my love. 
When turned the tide of fortune to the whites, 
And our affairs that erst had rode in state 



128 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

Now trudged afoot, my brother counselled peace. 

For this offence he slew him ; in his heart 

Buried an inch of steel that split mine too ; 

And with that hand of wrong 

Gouged out the eye of my esteem. 

I am familiar with his plans, will lead 

Thy forces to his hiding-place, and ask 

No recompense : his fall will pay me all. 

Still dost thou doubt ? Guard me — place at my 

back 
Spies to transcribe in volume of thy fear 
Each look and word and act, till thou admit 
The stars sooner will wander from their path 
Than I from my revenge. See ! 

[Takes a burning brand from the fire, ajtd thrusts it in 
his arni.\ 

If in the caverns of my blood there lurks 
Merely a globule of respect for him, 
I smoke it out. 

Church. Enough ! I do believe 

Thine honesty pants at the very side 
Of thy wild words. I will hear more of this. 
Walk there aside. — Golding, double the guards. 
If this be but a ruse, it takes us not. 
As to the matter of our former speech, 
If I have stepped out of my whilom self. 
My change hath reason in it. But no more. 
The morrow steals apace when we shall need 
Our all of man to meet and push aside 
That desperate arm. To rest awhile. — 
Wampanoag ! 

Golding. Our fortunes walk with thee ! 

\Exeunt^ 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. I29 

SCENE V. — PoKANOKET. A swamp. Remains of an 
Indian camp under the larch and spruce. The 
morning twilight. 

Enter Tuspaquin and Tatoson. 

Tuspaquin. Tatoson, 

Vainly I seek in battle's crimson bed 
Those shadowy arms : from my embrace they fly 
Aghast, and leave me still alone with grief. 

Tatoson, Let not these inward fiends 
Assail thee, Assawomset : time will smooth 
His face to welcome, and in war's dread court 
Divorce thy soul from this much-hated life. 

Tuspaquin. If he with torture or with banishment, 
A heavier lot, had paid my grievous fault, 
I would have smiled ; but when I never hear 
The foot of menace tread upon his lips. 
Nor while his face sinks in that gulf of gloom 
Speaking more loud than words his agony. 
His looks and manners throw on me no blame, 
I breathe but bear no life. In Paugak stream 
I will wash off the knowledge of myself. \Exit, 

Tatoson. If self-destruction mangled not 

The body of our creed, he would conspire 
'Gainst his own life. 

Enter Philip and At<in aw an, 

Philip. Go at once 

Unto the red oak swale : hence send a brave 
To spy me if the whites have broken camp. 
Bring me word here. \Exit Tatoson. 

Annawan, 



130 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

We are a prey to fate, and in the throes 
Of cold mortality our fortunes lie. 

Annazuan. Shake off those thoughts ! If they 
still haunt thy mind, 
Fling- at them slaughtered men. 

Philip. 'Tis written on the sky ! 
The sun's red face was muffled in eclipse ; 
And on the silver arm of the wan moon 
There himg a red man's scalp. The Manitou 
Sorely is vexed, and turns his face away. 

Annazvan, Tush ! 

At the great bar he cannot charge that we 
Folded the arms of duty, and let run 
Unchecked this new disease in our dear land. 

Philip. Bravest of men ! how like a second self 
Have been thy ways to me ! 

Armaiuan. Say not, Pometacom ! 

I love a battle better than a feast. 

Philip. How many moons have brooched with 
light 
The livid breast of night, since we began ? 

Annawan. Twelve as I think, Pometacom. 

Philip. Thou art a novice in arithmetic : 
In only twelve could treason spawn and hatch 
Some monstrous brood ? Say rather since the 

world 
Wore infant looks, this hath been plotting. No ! 
We wage a war with phantoms of the air : 
But strike them down, and feed the greedy earth 
With what they have of blood, new forces rise 
In mocking tongues to question our report, 
And all our work undo. 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 13I 

Annawan, Hath their great sea 

Crumbled thy fortitude ? 

Philip. If in my veins a drop of blood 
Courses that doth advise this heart to fear, 
I beg thee sluice it out. 

Annawan. My Sachem ! 

Philip. No ! 

I am a brother to the elements, 
All iron as they are : 

I would not make a sinner of my thoughts, 
And clothe my latter days in infamy, 
By bating but a jot the righteous hate 
I bear that race. 

Re-enter Tatoson. 

Tatoson. The pale-faces have pierced the swamp. 

Philip. How near ! 

Tatoson, Two bow-shots off. 

[ Yells and warwhoops in the distance. 

Philip. Fain would I borrow now 

Smiles from my happier days, to greet this news. 
Come, Annawan, there are lives to have. 

Annawan, Now thou art perfect. [Exeunt. 

E?iter Church, Alderman, and soldiers. 
Church, That way they fled. Be vigilant and 
firm. 
It is a blessed hand and bathed in gold. 
That brings the head of the Pokanoket. 
Alder 7nan. The voice of Agamaug speaks from 
the grave 
Louder than thine. {Reports of guns. 

Church, Ha ! their muskets call. Away ! 

{Exeunt, 



132 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

SCENE VI. — Another part of the Swamp. Some- 
fallen trees on one side ; on the other, higher 
ground covered with rocks and cedars. The day 
dawns. 

Enter Philip, Tatoson, and braves. 

Philip. Your loyalty revives my plant of life. 
Post some upon that mound : I will defend 
This forward path. Ask no quarter — give none. 

[Tatoson and part of the braves clamber up to the high 
ground.^ 

Enter Annawan. 

Annawan. The cowards, pah ! to run at the first 
blow ! 
Nushkah ! I'd rather drill these sticks and stones 
In forms of war, than captain such base creatures. 

Philip. It matters not : here will I take my 
stand. 
Many have travelled to the spirit land 
Bearing my passport on their brow ; and more^ 
The grim sentinel of that silent shore 
Shall challenge. So, farewell, my grizzled brave !' 
Thee have I loved as father, friend, and guide,, 
In whose clear soul my purpose could reside 
As in its native home — a long farewell ! 
And for a time condemn thyself to dwell 
Among the race of men. Nay, do not stay f 
Live to report me in my little day : 
How worshipped I the dear Wampanoag name, 
And toiled to blazon it in deeds of fame 
On old tradition's scroll ; and when it fell, 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 133 

That fatal hour did strike mine own death knell. 
Why dost thou stand ? 

Annaivan. Because I smell a danger ; 

For if I knew a village of delight 
Where peace did dwell, and here unbottomed ran 
Rivers of blood, nothing could stir me hence. 
My hatchet laughs, my knife in ecstasy 
Leaps to my hand, and calls it shame of shame 
To kennel but in blood. 

Enter Soldiers. 

First Soldier, Surrender, Philip ! 
Annazvayi. Do not jest with us. \Shoots him. 
First Soldier. I felt 

The spur of glory, and lie here. \pies. 

Enter Tuspaquin, 

Second Soldier. He wears a head of gold 
Which must be mine. \Levels his gun at Philip. 

Tuspaquin. Thine is too mean a hand. 
\Strikes down his musket and buries a knife i?t his throat. 

Gleams anywhere a blade 
Hungry for blood, let it drink mine. 

Third Soldier. Here, brighten this for higher 

work! 
Tuspaquin. No, thou must go to smooth my way. 
\Dashes his tomahawk in his brain. 
Why is it so ? 
I ask thee not for immortality. 
Fourth Soldier. Let me but try this edge on 
thee. \Stabs Tuspaquin. 



134 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

Tiispaqiiin. How thou hast whetted it ! — 
Sachem Pometacom— \^Dies, 

Philip. Brave Tuspaquin ! — 

Pale-face, he waits for thee ! 
[ Tomahawks and scalps him : holds aloft the scalp-lock 
and utters the terrible warzuhoop.'\ 
I live again ! Let him that hates the sun 
Look on my face. 

Fourth Soldier. Hell hound ! 
In thine own sulphur burn ! How dark it is ! 

iDies. 
Annaivan. How triumph doth caress our hand ! 

Come on ! 
Philip. Their spirits light my way. 

I chide mine arm that is so merciful. 
But here are more. 

Enter Golding, Alderman, and soldiers on the rocks 
above. They fight with Tatoson and his braves 
and drive them off. 

Alderman. Down, and take him ! 

Philip. Dog ! dost thou crawl 
Back to my sight, to be whipped hence ? 

Aldermaji. The foot, 

The stealthy foot of vengeance never sleeps. 

Philip. On thy crossed brow 

Black shame shall ever sit. 

Alderman. My brother's love 

Shall wash it pure as snow. 

Philip. Never ! 

Together ye shall swim in pitchy waves 
That roll on black hell shore — and on thy front 



PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 135 

Lettered in fire that word of infamy, 
Traitor. But touch the banks, a cloven foot 
Deeper shall push you in. 

Goldi7tg. No parley ! Philip, throw down thine 
arms, 
And to our justice yield. 

Philip, Come, and take them. 

Golding. The red bullet shall knock at thy 
heart. \Fires. 

Philip. It shall be welcome. 
I care not when I go, so that it be 
In hand with honor. Herald me ! 

\Hiirls a tomahawk winch grazes the cheek of Al- 
derman and sinks in the breast of a soldier. '\ 

Alderman. Thy flint was cold : 

For mine it is reserved. \Fires. 

Goldijig. He falls ! 

Alderman. And by his fall, 

Ye are raised up. 

Enter Church and soldiers zvith captives. 

Philip. Annawan, 

Thy hand— so ! I had hoped to make our land 
A graced place where no forest voices should 
Impeach our power ; and where in all his walk 
The sun should cast no shadow of a white. 
But my dear plans were snared in treason's net, 
And it is time Pometacom stepped down 
Into the silence. 

Oh treachery ! what soil Vv^as in my life 
That thou shouldst grow so profligate and rank ! 

[Dies. 



136 PHILIP OF POKANOKET. 

Annawan, My Sachem, art thou gone ? — 
Pluck every fear out of your craven hearts ; 
For he your dark despair in wonder robed, 
Hath passed into his father's summer land. 

Alder Dtan. My brother's ghost mourning be- 
neath the clay. 
Now, well-contented, travels on its way. 

Church. Thy deed speaks for thee. Alderman, 
in tongue 
Whose echo shall be heard around the world. 
The ruined fields, the towns in ashes laid, 
The sacred lives plunged in their timeless graves, 
Gather to them a voice out of the dust, 
And call thee to the banquet of their praise. 
Misfortune dogs us all : I have a loss 
Espousing me to sorrow through my life. 
The path of satisfaction shalt thou tread ; 
But I will house me by my noble dead. 
Tokens to strew on that pa'-hetic mound 
Whose heaving turf my haggard thoughts will 

bound 
Till death shall wave his banner on my brow. 
Golding shall stamp the embers out ; but thou 
Bequeath to me the arm that owes his life. 
And on our borders quenched the fires of strife. 

Alderman. It is thine. 

The End. 



